


Magic follows courage

by mtothedestiel



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Angst with a Happy Ending, Artist Steve Rogers, Ballroom Dancing, Bottom Steve, Chronic Illness, Fairy Godparents, Fairy Tale Style, Fluff and Angst, Frottage, Kissing, Loss of Parent(s), Love at First Sight, M/M, Male Cinderella, Marriage, Oral Sex, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Romance, True Love, prince bucky
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-15
Updated: 2015-04-21
Packaged: 2018-03-18 02:10:21
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 27,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3552110
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mtothedestiel/pseuds/mtothedestiel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A Cinderella AU.  Steve is as kind and brave as his body is frail and sickly, which is to say very.  Meanwhile, Prince Bucky must marry for the good of his kingdom, but he knows he will never find love with a princess.  Can courage, and a little magic, help Steve attend a ball, and Prince Bucky find his True Love?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Here we are, in my very harlequin version of Cinderella, featuring our two favorite super soldiers. We'll be seeing skinny!Steve, but Bucky will be post WS, with long hair and his metal arm. I just saw the new Cinderella movie and it moved me to start writing this, and to my surprise it's actually starting to come together! Enjoy!  
> P.S. As with most Cinderella retellings, this prologue is very sad. However, magic and courage will soon make things right.

“Steven.” 

Steve looks up from his coloring.  The butcher’s wife had given him a whole pile of brown paper scraps a few days ago, and he has been coloring ever since with the pencils his mother got him for his birthday.  Steve likes to make drawings.  He draws people and places from his village, and he tries to copy illustrations from his father’s books.  The lines never come out as straight as he likes, and he can tell the colors aren't quite right because of his eyesight, but the pictures always made his mother smile, and so any time he can get his hands on some paper Steve is drawing. 

Steve puts his colored pencils down when he sees the solemnity of Dr. Erskine’s expression.  The doctor kneels in front of him, so that they can speak eye to eye.  Dr. Erskine is kind that way.  He never makes him feel small, or weak, even though Steve definitely is. 

Dr. Erskine’s voice is soft, and achingly sad.  Steve’s heart breaks in his chest, because he already knows what the doctor is going to say.  They’ve known it was coming for months. 

“Steven, it’s time.”

“What’s going to happen to me?” Steve asks.  Their village is so small, too small for an orphanage.

“It will be alright, my boy,” Dr. Erskine assures him, “Your father will return soon from the war.  Until then I will look after you.  You will not be alone.” 

“Thank you.”  Steve whimpers into the doctor’s jacket, allowing himself a moment of weakness.  Steve is ten years old and nearly grown, but he figures that when your mother is dying even nearly grown boys are allowed to cry. 

“There, there,” Dr. Erskine soothes him, offering Steve his clean white handkerchief, “Now, Steven.  Your mother would like to see you.  Are you ready to be brave?”

Steve nods.  He doesn’t trust his voice, and any words he can manage he wants to save for his mother. 

Dr. Erskine takes Steve by the hand and guides him into his mother’s room.  Steve knows the way.  He’s spent much of the last few weeks in this room, doing his best to keep his mother’s spirits up, but this time as he walks through the doorway, Steve can sense the finality.  His mother smiles when she sees him, and reaches out with a trembling hand.

“Steve.”  Even pale and weak, Sarah Rogers is still beautiful.  “My sweet boy, come sit with me.”

Steve was afraid, but now he eagerly scrambles onto his mother’s bedside.  Sarah is propped with soft pillows, her gold hair framing her face like a halo.  Steve soaks in the sight of his mother’s face.  He knows he will draw it every day, so that he can carry her sweet expression with him forever. 

“Have you brought something to show me, darling?” his mother asks, and Steve remembers the butcher paper drawing in his hands.  He carefully unfolds the paper in his mother’s lap, pointing out the figures so that she can see.

“There’s you,” he tells her, “And me, in front of our cottage.  And there is Father.  He’s small, because he’s far away, but he’s on his way home to us.” 

Sarah traces the drawing with shaking fingers. 

“It’s beautiful, Steve,” his mother says, taking Steve’s hand, “You have so much talent.  And so much courage.  I think there might not be another boy in the world with as much courage as you have.” 

Steve doesn’t feel brave.  He tries to smile for his mother, but a few fat tears steal their way down his cheeks against his will.

“Oh no, my darling, don’t cry,” his mother urges him, pulling Steve into her embrace.  He makes sure his bad ear is against her chest, so Steve can hear his mother’s voice and not the rattle deep in Sarah’s lungs.

“I don’t want you to leave,” Steve pleads, winding his fingers into his mother’s loose nightgown.  Her fingers stroke through his hair, soft and loving. 

“I wish it were up to us,” she says, “If it were I would never part from your side.  I love you so much.”

Steve is still holding his mother’s hand.  Already her fingers feel cold, as though Death is close by, but Steve refuses to let go. 

“My brave boy,” Sarah murmurs, “You are going to bring so much magic to the world, Steve.  You’re brimful of goodness and courage, and magic always follows courage.”

“Magic is real?” Steve pops his head up, and his mother laughs.

“Of course, my love,” she tells him, “Magic is everywhere.  Sometimes you know it, when a magician does a trick, but sometimes it can surprise you.  Sometimes magic means working hard to make a beautiful drawing, or knowing the right ingredients to make a sick person well.  And sometimes magic is love, so strong that it allows a mother to watch over her dear boy, even though she has to be far away.”

Steve’s eyes are full of tears again, and no amount of courage can stop them spilling down his cheeks.  Sarah is struggling to draw breath, but still she smiles and places one last kiss on her son’s brow. 

“Magic,” she whispers in Steve’s good ear, “Means that I will always be with you.  No matter what.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ten years later...

“Well this is a great start to my protection duties.”

“Nonsense, Sam.  That killer squirrel nearly got me.  The monarchy is in your debt.”

“Hardy har har.  If it had been a wild boar like I thought you’d be thanking me right now.”

Bucky laughs, hiking Sam’s arm a little higher over his shoulder as they limp into the small village just out of the woods were Bucky and his entourage had been hunting.  Well, Sam limps.  His new Captain of the Guard had been a little overzealous in his vow to protect the crown prince of the realm, and unfortunately suffered a twisted ankle for his efforts.

In his hubris Bucky had insisted on a minimal guard for their casual outing, so now he was helping bear Sam’s weight alone while his remaining two men took the front and back watch of their motley unit.

The first few villagers begin to poke their heads out to see the royal commotion and just in time Bucky remembers to tuck his left hand into the pocket of his forest green hunting coat. 

“Sam, do you still have my gloves?”

“What?”  A few beads of sweat have gathered on his Captain’s brow, and his usually rich dark skin has taken on a slight pallor.  Bucky hopes it’s merely from exertion and pain, not from shock.  “Oh, yeah, I’ve got ‘em, Highness.”

“I told you Sam, Bucky is fine,” he urges, using Sam as a shield from the eyes of the curious villagers so that he can slip the fitted leather glove over his shining metal fingers.  Sam laughs, still leaning heavily on Bucky.

“I’ll keep what protocol I’ve got left to me at the moment, thanks,” he says, “I won’t be explaining to Her Majesty why half the country side has picked up on your private nickname.”

“As you wish, Captain,” Bucky allows, “Look there.  I do believe this may be the doctor we’ve been told about.”

The building is little more than a cottage, but it is adorned with a simple but skillfully rendered sign: _Abraham Erskine, Doctor and Apothecary_.  Below the inscription is painted a gold caduceus, as well as a mortar and pestle. 

Bucky has little time to admire the sign as his captain lets out a low sound of pain, and he pulls the thin bell cord beside the front entrance, hoping the doctor is at home.  Fortunately after a few moments the door opens, and a bespectacled man a few decades past middle age answers with a curious but friendly greeting. 

“Dr. Erskine, I presume,” Bucky greets him, “I am James, and this is my guard, Sam.  I’m afraid we’ve had a slight hunting accident.  Could we trouble you for your diagnosis?”

The doctor is not a foolish man, that much is evident.  His eyes need only to pass over Bucky’s clothes, and the two additional guards who have taken up their posts on either side of his front door, to parse “James’” true identity.

“Your Highness,” the doctor says in a soft accent, offering Bucky a slight bow, “It would be my pleasure to assist you.  Please come in.”

Dr. Erskine ushers them in to a small, but clean room clearly designated as his place of practice.  The open windows allow plenty of natural light and healthy air while the crisp white curtains give the royal patients privacy from the rest of the village.  A door is cracked open on the far wall, presumably leading into Dr. Erskine’s personal residence.   Sam is quickly deposited onto a cushioned bench and his ankle elevated.  The doctor offers Bucky a nearby chair while he examines his captain, which Bucky takes gratefully.  Bucky is relieved to see Sam’s condition has already improved simply from taking the weight off his ankle.  After a few moments of careful prodding, Dr. Erskine can confirm Bucky’s intuition.

“The good news,” the doctor explains as he pulls a long strip of bandage from a nearby drawer, “Is that nothing is broken.  But I am afraid your captain will not be riding for a few days, Your Highness.”

“Still, that is a relief, Dr. Erskine, thank you,” Bucky says, resting a hand on his captain’s shoulder, “I fear you’ve been poorly rewarded for your service, Sam.  My apologies.”

His guard and friend waves him off.  “All part of the job, Highness,” Sam assures him with a grin, “I’ll be back in action in no time.”

“Good man,” Bucky says, “I’ve already sent for a carriage from the palace.  Hopefully we won’t impose on your for too long, doctor.”

“You are welcome to stay as long as you need,” Dr. Erskine demurs, wrapping Sam’s ankle tight with bandage in order to stabilize the joint, “Would either of you care for some tea?  I had just started the kettle when you arrived.”

“That would be lovely, thank you.”

Dr. Erskine finishes wrapping Sam’s ankle and then pulls a whistling kettle of a small hearth in the corner of the room.  In no time at all Bucky has a steaming cup of tea in his hand.  Despite the warm summer weather the drink is soothing after the adventure of the afternoon.  While they wait for the carriage, Bucky takes a careful stroll of the room, pausing to note the charming collection of paintings decorating the doctor’s walls.

“You have a fine art collection, doctor,” Bucky observes, moving from one small canvas to the next, “Do you paint?”

Dr. Erskine laughs over his own chipped cup. 

“Certainly not, Your Highness,” he says, “I have a steady hand, but I lack the creative talent of the friend who gifted those to me.”

“They are very skillful,” Bucky says, pausing, “This one in particular is striking.”

The painting in question is a lush pastoral landscape.  Eye catching colors render a field of wildflowers guarded by a copse of nearby elm trees.  A few sheep dot the foreground, enjoying the shade beneath the trees while warm spring daylight lights the flowers in the middle and background.  The work leaves him with an overwhelming feeling of serenity.

“Yes, the valley you see there is one frequented by the village shepherds,” Dr. Erskine explains, “Though I daresay the real thing is not so beautiful as Steven has painted it.”

“It is enchanting,” Bucky murmurs, admiring the fine hand evident in the brushwork.  An impulse strikes him, and Bucky has to see it to its fruition.

 “I wonder, doctor, if you might sell it to me?”

 

* * *

 

Steve can hardly believe his ears.  Well, his ear, the good one he has pressed up against Dr. Erskine’s parlor door.  The prince wants to buy _his_ painting!  Steve fears his fragile heart may well give out from the shock as the prince admires his skill. It’s remarkable, considering Steve can’t even really see the colors properly to paint them.

 _Sell it,_ he silently urges his friend through the thin wood of the door, _Say yes._

“Certainly, Your Highness,” Dr. Erskine answers the prince’s query, to Steve’s relief. 

“Only if you are willing,” the prince assures him, “I don’t want to steal away a gift from a friend.”

“Steven is very generous with his work,” the doctor says, “I have no doubt he would be willing to paint me another landscape when he hears who has purchased this one.”

The prince laughs and Steve’s heart stutters from the bright, happy sound.  He’d ducked into Dr. Erskine’s parlor when the prince and his guard had interrupted his treatments that day, and hadn’t had the chance to catch a glimpse of the mysterious Prince James, but from that sound Steve has to imagine the prince is a handsome man. 

Steve hears the jingle of coins, how much, he doesn’t dare imagine. 

“Is this an acceptable exchange?” the prince asks, “I trust your judgment of the work, doctor.”

“Yes,” Dr. Erskine’s voice is shaken, maybe with surprise, “Yes I’m certain the artist would find this a fair price.”

“Your Highness,” interrupts a new voice, “Your carriage is here.”

“Excellent,” the prince declares, and there is some rustling, presumably as he helps his captain to his feet, “You shall be safe in bed in no time, Sam.  And we’ll have this delightful work of art to accompany us home.”

“I’m glad you’ve found a silver lining to this day, Highness,” the captain’s voice is dry, but warm.  Steve can tell that the guard is very fond of his charge.

“Thank you for your help, doctor,” the prince says genuinely, and Steve can hear another exchanging of coins before the royal entourage leave’s Dr. Erskine’s office, no doubt bound for the palace.  Steve waits until he can hear the carriage pull away from the cottage before reemerging. 

“Is he gone?” Steve asks, poking his head back in to Dr. Erskine’s office at last. 

“Yes, Steven, he’s gone,” Dr. Erskine says, exasperated, “Though I’m still not sure why you insisted on hiding.  I’m sure the prince could have been patient for a few moments while I finished with your powders.”

“The prince doesn’t need to catch my head cold,” Steve excuses himself, “Besides I’m glad I decided to eavesdrop, to hear one of my paintings sold to _royalty_.”

“That is a remarkable occurrence, though I am sorry to have sold it without consulting you,” Dr. Erskine says, mixing several powders into a glass vial, “I hope you do not feel I was eager to part with your gift.”

“No, no, are you kidding me?” Steve exclaims, grinning ear to ear, “Abraham, a prince, _the_ crown prince of the realm liked my work!  My painting might even hang in the _palace_.”

“Well I doubt his highness would hide it under the bed,” Dr. Erskine chuckles, “Considering how handsomely he paid for it.  Speaking of which…”

Dr. Erskine pulls a handful of money from his jacket pocket, dropping the prince’s payment into Steve’s open palm.  Steve’s heart flutters even more than usual as he watches the pile of silver coins grow taller and taller in his hand.

“I have never seen so much silver in one place,” Steve breathes, shocked at the prince’s generosity.

“Prince James didn’t blink at the price,” Dr. Erskine tells him, “And neither should you.  You give your work away so freely to those in need.  It’s fitting that your kindness be repaid by someone who can afford it.”

“This is too much money for me,” Steve insists.  He splits the coins into two piles, nearly in half.  The larger pile he offers to his friend. 

“Steven, don’t be ridiculous,” Erskine scolds him, “You earned that money, with hard work and talent.  Besides, the prince has already overpaid me for my own services.” 

“Please,” Steve says, holding out the small stack of coins, “Consider it a commission for selling the painting.  I know you don’t charge me enough for all the medicines I need.  I would like to pay you back, now that I can.”

Dr. Erskine sighs, shaking his head with a fond smile.  After a moment he closes Steve’s hand around the lion’s share and takes the smaller pile of silver from his other hand. 

“Fine,” he allows, “Since you are going to be so stubborn.  But I also consider this an advance on any treatments to come, through the winter, at least.”

Steve drops back onto his chair.  “You drive a hard bargain, doctor.” 

Steve slips the coins into the small satchel he carries with him, safe in a pocket beside his colored pencils and the small iron key that opens his front door.  Ten silver pieces.  Steve still doesn’t think his work is worth so much, but he won’t pretend he’s not relieved to have the money.  Steve has enough to get by, with frequent commissions for signs and portraits around the village, but the prince’s money will mean a new pair of shoes, and a warm winter coat to keep the chill out of Steve’s lungs this winter, not to mention a fresh stack of canvases.

“Now,” Dr. Erskine says, pouring Steve’s medicine carefully into an oilcloth bag, “All done.  I won’t bore you with the instructions again.”

“One teaspoon in my tea, twice a day,” Steve recites dutifully. 

“Yes, yes,” Erskine mutters, sealing the package with wax, “And if your chest starts to feel tight?”

“Steam,” Steve answers, “And rest.”

“Excellent,” the doctor says, handing Steve his concoction, “Your heart sounds very good today, as good as it can be, anyway, and your color is back.  I believe with some caution you may finally put this latest head cold behind you, my boy.  Don’t chase after any burglars on your way home, and I think you will be breathing easy for a while.”

“That was only one time,” Steve shoots back, coloring at the mention of him humiliating one-time attempt at heroism.

“And Colonel Phillips was very grateful to have his walking stick returned to him,” Erskine agrees, “But I still hardly think it was worth the two weeks of bed rest it took to recover after you climbed through that bog on the way back.”

“It never costs too much to do the right thing,” Steve insists, tucking his medicine into his satchel.  He stands and slips his thin coat back over his shirtsleeves. 

“You are a shining example to us all, I’m sure,” Dr. Erskine says, voice dry, “Take care, Steven.  You know I’m here if you ever need assistance.” 

“Thanks doc,” Steve mumbles, “Same to you.”

With a final farewell to his oldest friend Steve begins the short journey home to his own cottage.  A half-mile out of town, it is perhaps too far a distance for someone of Steve’s health to be walking to and from everyday.  Dr. Erskine would have Steve live with him, as he did for a few years after his mother’s death, but as a man Steve wants to honor his parents by keeping it up as best he can.  The cottage is his childhood home, and Steve can’t bear to part with it over mere practicality.

It’s a fine day, and for once Steve’s lungs don’t trouble him on his brisk walk.  In no time at all Steve is pushing through the low gate that marks the edge of his garden.  “Garden” is a somewhat generous term for the wild growth of weeds and perennials that has taken over the front of the cottage, but Steve had struggled with a long bout of bronchitis that spring, and had missed the proper season for taming the lawn.       

He’s barely through the gate before a raggedy ginger tom cat is winding around his legs, threatening to trip Steve up on the uneven cobblestones.

“Hello, Dum Dum,” Steve greets the cheeky feline, “it’s been quite a day.  I’ve brought you some fish to celebrate, but you have to let me get to the door first.”

Dum Dum follows Steve into the cottage, making his hunger known with a piercing yowl even Steve couldn’t miss. 

“Hold on, hold on,” Steve urges, coughing when he puts his satchel down and kicks up a large cloud of dust, “Ugh.  We’ve got some housework to do before we sleep tonight, old friend.”

Steve leaves Dum Dum to the small pile of herring he had traded the fisherman for that morning, and he finds a few clean rags and some water.  The Rogers house is by no means large, but even a few days bedridden and Steve has fallen behind in his upkeep of the few rooms.  Dust and dirt are not just a nuisance to Steve, but a danger.  Steve looks to his mother’s portrait, the first he ever painted, hanging over the mantelpiece.  The same illness that claimed her life resides in Steve’s lungs, and he must take care. 

“Alright,” Steve announces to the house’s populace, namely himself and Dum Dum, “We will dust, then clean out the fireplace, then laundry.  Assuming there is any daylight left, we will then adjourn outdoors to work on the new sign for Mrs. Fitzwilliam’s dress shop.”

Dum Dum pauses in his feasting to offer Steve a lethargic glance, as if to say, _have fun with that_. 

“Excellent,” Steve concludes, shedding his jacket, “Let’s get started.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The prince is throwing a ball!

“There.”  Bucky steadies the small canvas before stepping back to admire the adjusted salon wall.  “I think it looks lovely, don’t you, mother?  Perfect height, and it complements the water lilies nicely.”

Bucky gazes with satisfaction at the landscape he’d purchased only yesterday.  He still can’t say what it is that draws him so deeply into the image, only that it brings him peace, and a strange sense of longing.  Perhaps it is merely the presence of the artist’s hand in the brushstrokes, leaving Bucky to imagine the shape and dexterity of the limbs in question, and the visage that must accompany them.  Surely no one with such a beautiful view of the world could be ugly themselves.

The queen huffs behind him and Bucky is drawn out of his day dream and returned to the sitting room where he was sharing tea with his mother and sister.  Well, Rebecca is more an observer than a participant, as she is only nearing two years old.  The princess plays on the lush carpet while a few servants clear away their cups and saucers.

“I don’t care for it, James,” the queen scolds, “The whole misadventure.  You gallivanting off on hunting trips and stumbling into villages after no commoner has seen you for years.  You’re meant to be waiting for the ball, where we can present you properly.”

“I am as ‘presentable’ as can be, Mother,” Bucky reminds her, “I’m in fighting shape, the nightmares are all but gone, and we’ve managed to bring gloves back into style, which hides my disfigurement quite nicely.”

“That is not what I meant and you know it, dear,” his mother chides, “Really, must you be so crude.”

“I’m not looking forward to all the formalities,” Bucky complains, “Why can’t we just throw the party and let people dance?  I never get to dance, what with all the introductions and kowtowing.”

“You will have plenty of dance partners this time,” his mother says lightly, “In fact I’m going to insist on it.”

“Well that’s very kind of you-“

“Because at the end of the night,” she continues, “You will select one of the young women you dance with to be your bride.”

“What?”  Bucky can barely contain his surprise.  “Surely, you’re joking.”

“Not at all,” his mother says, “That is the whole purpose of the festival.  It is time for you to be married, James.”

“I’m fairly certain that is something a man must decide for himself, mother,” Bucky scowls.  His mother ignores him.

“I have invited dozens of options that could provide an advantage to our kingdom,” the queen explains, offering his sister a silver rattle, “One of the maidens at the ball will be bound to please you.”

The room is awkwardly silent but for the soft jingling of Rebecca’s toy.

“Mother,” Bucky sighs, “You know what I am.  I will never find love with a princess, or any woman.”

“Love is not the only factor in a royal marriage,” his mother reminds him gently, “You have the makings of a fine king, James, but even a fine king faces danger when he has no heirs.”

“Rebecca can be my heir,” Bucky insists, pulling his infant sister into his lap.  She squeals in delight, playing with the bronze fastenings on Bucky’s velvet coat. 

“See? She has the air of a queen already,” Bucky laughs, “And when I am old and grey she will still be in the prime of her life.  Our line will not end on account of my romantic notions, mother.”

His queen mother does not share Bucky’s good humor. 

“The invitations are sent, James,” she declares, “The ball will go forward, and you will choose a bride.”

Winifred is queen, and Bucky must defer to her authority, but even respect for his mother cannot keep the glower from his face.  His mother sighs, and rises to leave, pausing at Bucky’s side.  

“I do not ask you to feign affection you cannot feel,” the queen murmurs.  She combs her fingers through Bucky’s hair, as she once did when he was no bigger than Rebecca.  “But you will take a wife.  You will treat her with deference, and you will honor our house with children.  It is what your lord father would have wanted.”

The queen exits to deal with matters of state, her lady in waiting at her heels.

“What Father would have wanted,” Bucky mutters rebelliously to Rebecca after his mother leaves, “Would be for those who favor their own sex to be free to do so.  He did pass a law saying as much, after all, and I don’t imagine he meant for his own son to be the exception.”

Rebecca’s rosy lips form an appropriate pout to match her brother’s, and Bucky chuckles, holding his sibling close.

“Fear not, little sister,” Bucky whispers into his sister’s bonnet, “You at least, will be free to find your True Love.  I will see to it.”

 

* * *

 

 

Steve is teetering on a high step stool, trying to hold his sign steady for Mrs. Fitzwilliam’s approval, when he hears the news.

“A ball?” he asks the seamstress’s daughter, who’s just come running from the village square.

“A ball!” Connie confirms, “They’ve just announced it.  It’s to be held at the palace, and everyone is invited, even commoners!”

“This is wonderful news,” Mrs. Fitzwilliam exclaims, “Connie, get the shop ready, we’re going to be flooded with business.  Steve dear, the sign is lovely.  Go ahead and nail it up and I’ll have your pay inside.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Steve agrees, pulling a hammer and tack from his back pocket. 

“I have to go,” he hears Connie still chatting to her mother, “They say the prince is going to choose his bride!  And think of the _gowns_.”

“Think of the gowns all you want, my dear,” Mrs. Fitzwilliam says, exasperated, “We’re going to spend the next week sewing most of them.”

Steve finishes hanging the sign and collects his commission before making his way home.  The village is bustling today, and the only gossip on anyone’s lips is about the ball.  Steve finds the excitement contagious, and he’s himself brimming with curiosity by the time he reaches his own front gate.

What is the palace like?  What nobles will be there, and what will they be wearing?  What will Prince James wear?  What does the prince even look like?  Will Steve’s painting be hanging somewhere that guests might see it?

With a jolt Steve realizes there’s nothing stopping _him_ from attending.  It’s a free party, and Connie said commoners were invited.  He need only find a ride to the palace and something acceptable to wear.  Steve closes his door and kneels to give his cat a good scratch behind the ears.

“The queen is throwing a ball,” he informs Dum Dum, a grin tugging at his lips, “And I’m thinking of going.”

The more he thinks on it, the more Steve’s heart flutters with excitement.  He could see the _palace_ , no doubt full of priceless art and treasures that would inspire him for years to come.  The very thought of the lords and ladies in all their finery makes his fingers itch for a pencil and paper.  He could even perhaps see the prince’s face, or maybe be so honored as to exchange a few words with him, and know what sort of man liked his painting enough to buy it at first sight. 

Still petting Dum Dum, Steve catches sight of his own paint stained sleeve, and his heart sinks.  What does he have to wear to a ball?  He has two sets of clothes, but even the nicer one that’s nearly paint free would be nowhere near formal enough to wear to the palace.  With the prince’s silver Steve could possibly have a new suit made in time, but that would cost the lion’s share of the coins, and he would have very little left over to live on for the winter.  It would be foolish to spend his savings on formal clothes he would only wear once. 

Steve is nearly ready to admit defeat, when his gaze falls on his mother’s portrait. 

 _Have courage_ , she always told him.  Beside the painting of his mother is the faded final drawing he’d made for Sarah, childishly simple compared to what he can do now, but Steve can’t bear to throw it out.  He’d had hope, when he’d drawn that picture, that one day his family would be reunited.  That expectation is long gone, but the scribbled blue figure of his father in the background gives Steve an idea.

“Maybe things are not yet hopeless,” Steve says to Dum Dum before standing and hesitantly going to the door of his mother’s bedroom.  Steve has left his mother’s things untouched since her death.  Despite technically being master of the house, Steve has remained in the cottage’s smaller bedroom, leaving his parent’s room undisturbed except to occasionally dust or open a window for some fresh air.  Steve rests his palm on the heavy wood for a moment before gathering his courage and entering.  Dum Dum, of course, follows him in.

“Stay off the bed, you rascal,” Steve orders the tom cat, who promptly ignores him.  Steve rolls his eyes before pulling his shirt over his nose to keep out the worst of the dust looking to the large armoire set against the far wall.  Steve bypasses his mother’s vanity and bookshelves full of curios that would set off all kinds of unwanted memories in favor of the wardrobe, which may just contain what Steve is looking for.  He only hesitates a moment before pulling open one of the darkly stained doors and looking within.

There.  In the very back, tucked behind his Sarah’s dresses, still shrouded and mothballed, hangs his father’s dress uniform.  Steve pulls the suit from the dusty armoire.  He carefully removes the pins and medals from the breast, laying them in his mother’s jewelry box for safekeeping.  Joseph Rogers wasn’t an officer, so there’s no fancy braid or epaulettes to worry about.

Steve lays the navy blue pants and jacket out on his bed, fingering the faded cuffs and tarnished fastenings.  The uniform was one of the few mementos Steve had of his father, along with a few love letters exchanged between his parents and a message of condolence from his father’s commanding officer that Steve had received only a few years after his mother had passed.  Steve doesn’t have to measure to see that the uniform will be far too long in the arms and legs, but it’s the nicest suit in his possession.

“What do you think, Dum Dum?” Steve asks his cat rhetorically, “With a few alterations I think it might just work.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Will Bucky be forced to marry against the wishes of his heart??? Will Steve have his wish to catch a glimpse of the prince fulfilled???? STay tuned!


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Strange magic...

“Do you think it’s silly?” Steve asks, “Me going to a fancy dress ball.”

He was standing in Dr. Erskine’s office again.  He’d quickly found the sewing on his father’s uniform to be beyond his skill level, but between two pairs of steady hands they had managed to take in the waist of his father’s coat enough that Steve was no longer drowning in it. 

“I think no such thing,” Dr. Erskine answers, a few pins between his teeth, “Parties are meant for young people.  Though you do not frequently behave as such, you are certainly a young person.  Now stand up straight.”

Steve tries to keep his shoulders back.  He’s finally trying on the suit for a few final adjustments, and it’s a little unsettling to be wearing his father’s clothes, Steve has to admit.  The material feels heavy on his shoulders.

“It is wrong to wear it?” Steve wonders, holding still for Erskine’s adjustments, “I’m not a soldier.”

“Nonsense,” Dr. Erskine says, helping Steve to cuff up the jacket sleeves to the right length, “You honor his memory.  There.”

Dr. Erskine steps aside so Steve can see himself in the mottled glass mirror.  The suit is too big in the shoulders, there’s no doubt, but with the sleeves shortened and the pants sewed up and belted tight it’s not so bad, Steve supposes.  The navy blue is faded, but the color still looks well with his hair and eyes.  Steve can polish the brass buttons tonight, and shine his boots.  He won’t be among the most eye catching at the ball, but he won’t shame himself.

“You look very handsome, Steven,” Erskine tells him, “Your mother would be proud.”

Steve blushes.  “I’d just like to see if my painting is on display,” he demurs, fiddling with the hem of his father’s suit.

“Who knows?” Erskine shrugs, “There could be a young woman or man there to catch your eye.  Don’t sell yourself short, my boy.”

Steve doesn’t dare to wish for such a thing.  It’s not that he doesn’t feel attraction, or longing, or loneliness…but love is for people who will live to see themselves reach thirty years old.  Steve is a poor artist with a bad heart and worse lungs.  Romance is not for him.

“For now I’d just like to make it to the ball,” Steve tells his friend.  A sudden tickle hits the back of his throat, and Steve is overcome with a coughing fit. 

“Good gracious,” Erskine exclaims, guiding Steve to sit on a nearby stool, “Are you alright?”

“No, no.  I’m fine,” Steve insists, gladly accepting a cup of water, “Just something caught in my throat.”

Erskine looks reasonably concerned, but to Steve’s relief he doesn’t try to push.  “Some dust from the suit, I suppose.”

“Yes,” Steve agrees, breathing carefully, “That must be it.”

“Regardless,” Erskine says, “You should head home, before it gets too chilly.  Your suit looks very fine.  I hope you have a wonderful time tomorrow, Steven.”

“Thank you, Abraham.”

Steve takes off his suit and puts it back in the cloth wrapping he found it in to protect it from the dusty road.  That leaves him in only his shirt sleeves to walk home, but the sun is still shining when Steve departs the doctor’s office, and his lungs only have a little tightness that Steve is confident will be cleared away with some tea and a good night’s sleep. 

The next day dawns and Steve’s optimism is not repaid in kind.  He has a pounding headache, and the stirrings of another vicious summer head cold.  Steve almost considers going back to town to seek Dr. Erskine’s advice, but he knows the long walk there and back would only worsen his condition.

Not to be defeated, Steve drinks three cups of tea with Dr. Erskine’s medicine, willing his lungs to clear and his head to stop swimming.  He tries to act normally, and get some work done, but today the smell of his paints makes his throat burn and his eyes water.  His hand shakes too much to paint even a simple steady line.  Eventually Steve gives up, and after he breathes some steam, he trudges back to bed, intending to rest until the evening arrives.

“If I get some sleep,” he tells Dum Dum, curled on the end of the bed, “I’ll be better by the time I need to get ready.”

Steve wakes up just as the sun is beginning to set, and he can’t deny he feels anything but awful.  His breath is a tight wheeze, and his head is congested.  Steve sits up and black spots swim before his vision.  When his sight clears, Steve can see his suit, laid out on his bed and waiting to be worn.   

“I’m going,” Steve growls, getting shakily to his feet, “And that’s final.”

Steve heats some water, washing his face and combing his hair.  He puts on his cleanest shirt and over that go his father’s pants and uniform jacket.  The material feels heavier than ever over Steve’s chest, and the collar feels choking on Steve’s already tight airways. 

“It’ll be alright,” Steve says to himself, buttoning up his jacket with unsteady fingers, “I can still go.  I’ll just find someplace quiet to sit down, and I can still see all the beautiful gowns and hear the music-“

Steve’s breath catches, and he barely gets to his handkerchief in time to catch the wet cough that erupts from his throat.  He steps backwards, and nearly trods on Dum Dum, who lets out a warning hiss.    

“S-sorry,” Steve tries to apologize, but he can’t seem to get his air back.  He stumbles into the kitchen, trying to keep the panic at bay as he coughs uncontrollably.  In his haste to find a drink of water Steve knocks a half full pitcher of milk off the counter.  Steve barely hears the ceramic shatter on his left side, and he manages to get a half full cup from the kettle left over from his earlier tea.  With a few sips Steve is able to take a shaking breath, though his heart is still racing, making him dizzy. 

Steve takes a step back and his booted foot skids on a broken piece of pitcher.  Woozy and disoriented, Steve falls face first into the mess of ceramic and milk.  He’s lucky not to have cut his hands or face, but his jacket front is sopping wet.

“No, no, _no_ ,” Steve cries, looking up, down, anywhere for something to clean up the milk soaking into his coat.  He tries to get up only to slip again land hard on his knees, only making the mess worse.  Steve still can hardly breathe, his head hurts, and his eyes are brimming with tears.  He manages to scoot out of the mess, and collapses against the fireplace wall, head in his hands. 

His father’s uniform is ruined.  Steve will be lucky to keep it from being stained forever, and he’ll never manage to clean it in time for the ball. 

Dum Dum crawls into his lap, nosing at Steve’s milk soaked front with a yowl.  The cat rubs his chin against Steve’s bowed head, and that is the last straw of Steve’s composure.

“Dum Dum,” Steve admits as the first fat tears roll down his cheeks, “I can’t go.  I’m sick.”

With his suit ruined Steve no longer cares about cat hair, and he buries his face in Dum Dum’s soft ginger fur.  For the first time in his life Steve gives in to his self pity, and he curses his weak body, his bad ear, his wheezing lungs, and his stupid, mucus prone sinuses.

“It’s not _fair_ ,” Steve weeps, “Just for one night, I wanted to look nice, and see the p-palace, and meet the prince…”

Steve cries and cries, until the sun has set and he’s sobbing alone in his darkened kitchen.  He’s never felt so lonely, or so hopeless.  He’s nearly run out of tears, when the pressure in the room suddenly changes, and Steve’s ears pop, making him jump.

“There, there, my darling.  You mustn’t give up so easily.”

Steve fears that too many fevers may have finally addled his brain.  But no, he did hear someone speak.  And…and there is someone combing their fingers through his hair, just as his mother once did.

“Yeah, kid.  It ain’t over ‘til it’s over.”

There’s more than one person.

Steve cracks open his tear swollen eyes.  There is a man in front of him on one knee, and to his right there is the most beautiful woman Steve has ever seen.  They both are dressed for a ball themselves, though their finery is much more beautiful than Steve’s even without the spilled milk.  The woman is wearing a green silk gown with a full skirt that covers half of Steve’s kitchen floor, and the man is in a bizarre suit in black and white, with coattails and a piece of fabric tied snug around his neck, almost like a cravat.

Despite their beautiful clothes, they’re still intruders, and Steve scoots back against the fireplace wall, fear making his heart pound arythmatically. 

“Whoa there,” the man urges him, “You’re gonna give yourself a heart attack.”

“Who-“ Steve wheezes, “Who are you?  How did you get in here?”

“I’m Peggy,” the woman introduces herself, “And this is Howard.  We’re your faerie godparents.”

“Faerie-“ Steve stammers, still sniffling, “But I don’t have faerie godparents.  That’s _impossible_.”

“Everyone with goodness in their heart has a faerie on their side,” Peggy explains, “And you, Steven Rogers, have so much goodness that you have two.  We only have so much power, so we’ve had to wait to intercede only at the most dire of moments.”

“And that moment is now,” Howard continues, “We think you’ve gotten the short end of the stick one too many times, and we’re here to make it right.”

“Make it right?” Steve wonders, doing his best to dry his eyes.  Peggy hands him an ivory silk handkerchief.

“That’s right,” she confirms, “You shall go to the ball, Steve.  We will make it so.”

Steve can hardly believe his ears.  “How?” he asks, dabbing at his eyes with Peggy’s handkerchief.

From somewhere, Howard pulls a thin wooden wand.  “Magic,” he explains, waving the wand in front of Steve’s face, “Now up and at ‘em.  We’ve got work to do.”

Howard and Peggy each give Steve a hand up, and once he’s on his feet Steve already feels better.  Maybe it’s just optimism, but his lungs already feel clearer, and his head not nearly so foggy.  Dum Dum leaps aside, flicking his tail indignantly. 

“You can fix my suit?” Steve asks, gesturing at the stains on his front.

“We can do more than that,” Howard tells him, “We’re gonna give you the deluxe package, starting with-“ Howard gestures at Steve’s general person “-this.  What do you think, Pegs?  The works?”

“I rather like him the way he is,” Peggy says fondly, which makes Steve feel strange and warm inside.  No one has ever had much nice to say about his scrawny form before tonight. 

“Yes, yes, inner beauty and all that,” Howard steam rolls, “But kid, you don’t want to go to the party wheezing and sniffling.  If you’re going to a ball, you should be able to _dance_.”

With that Howard taps Steve sharply on the crown with his wand.  Steve barely has time to yelp before a shower of gold sparks rain down from above and things start _changing_.

Oxygen rushes to his lungs, and for a few seconds Steve sees stars.

“Easy there, big guy.”  Howard speaks on his left side and Steve jumps at the volume of his voice.  He can _hear_.  Peggy laughs and Steve double takes because he can see her lips are bright red and her gown is emerald green instead of a grayish olive. 

“I imagine you’re feeling better,” Peggy guesses, and Steve can only nod, shocked.  He holds a hand to his heart, which is racing with a steady rhythm for once, and he yelps when he feels bulk under his fingertips where there was none.  He has muscle, and broad shoulders, and- 

“I’m-I’m _tall_ ,” Steve breathes, dumbstruck with wonder.  His kitchen, never large, now seems remarkably cramped.  Steve takes a step back and nearly hits his head on the mantelpiece.

“A tall, drink of water, more like,” Howard crows, “You’ll turn some heads at the ball now.”

“I’ll admit it’s a striking transformation,” Peggy agrees, “Good health suits you.  And this jacket is a much better fit.”

Steve stares down at his beautiful formal clothes, silk and velvet adorning his new body.

His suit is all in blue, with silver star fastenings across his chest and at his throat, and polished black boots on his feet.  The jacket hugs his now well-formed chest and Steve blushes to see how snug the pants are across his front.    

“Don’t be self-conscious darling,” Peggy says, looking Steve over appreciatively, “We’ve only highlighted a few of your…finer features.  Though perhaps as a whole it could use a little something extra.  Hold out your hands, Steve.”

Steve obeys, noting that his hands are now covered in crisp white gloves, but otherwise unchanged from his original ones.  With a flourish, Peggy sends a smaller wave of sparks and the white gloves shift to a deep and striking scarlet.

“You have such lovely hands,” Peggy notes, “We should make sure people notice.”

“Huh,” Howard says, “It’s a little patriotic for my taste, but we’re not in France, so who cares?  You look great, kid.”

“Quite,” Peggy adds, smiling, “Now, what’s next, Howard?  Steve certainly can’t _walk_ to the palace.”

“Too right you are, my dear, too right,” Howard agrees, “Let’s see…do you by chance have a garden?”

“Um, yes,” Steve says, “Out front.  Though I’m afraid I haven’t been keeping it up.”

“Lead the way,” Peggy orders, “We’ll find something suitable, I’m sure.  Also, Mr. Cat, if you wouldn’t mind joining us.” 

To Steve’s continued amazement Dum Dum follows them right out into the yard.  Steve’s never seen his feline friend follow anyone’s instructions, but the tom cat seems quite taken with Peggy. 

Howard begins poking through the thick brambles and overgrown vegetables, nearly vanishing into the garden before Steve hears a triumphant “Aha!”

Howard emerges carrying a rather large pumpkin, he nearly stumbles under the weight, but he shoos away Steve’s offer of assistance.

“No way, kid,” he says, depositing the gourd just outside the front gate, “We don’t want any dirt on that shirtfront.  Now, what are the words again?  Bibbity Bobbity-“ 

“I’ll handle this, if you don’t mind, Howard,” Peggy interrupts him, “You don’t have such a good record with carriages, if you recall.”

Howard cedes her point gracefully, and Peggy waves her wand over the pumpkin, and Steve is once again blinded by a flood of gold sparks. 

When Steve blinks the stars from his eyes where there was a pumpkin there is now a golden carriage unlike anything Steve has ever seen.

“It’s beautiful,” Steve observes, puzzled at the strange, shimmering carriage, “But there’s nowhere to harness any horses.” 

“Don’t need ‘em, my friend,” Howard says, kicking the white walled rubber tires and tapping on the elongated front hood, “Got all the horsepower you need right here.  That’s the way of the future.”

“I think you’ll do just fine without footmen,” Peggy muses, already focused on the next task, “But you simply _must_ have a driver.  Mr. Cat, if you please.”

Dum Dum presents himself presently, and with a _zap_ of magic Steve’s cat is transformed before his eyes. In the feline’s place is a portly man with fuzzy red whiskers and a bowler cap, of all things. 

“Pleasure to be of service,” the man bows, tilting his cap in Peggy’s direction, “Though I do prefer Dum Dum, if you don’t mind ma’am.”

“Dum Dum.  Lovely,” Peggy agrees, and the former tom cat takes his place in the driver’s seat of the golden carriage.

“Alright Steve-o,” Howard says, opening the back door with a flourish, “Time to get to that party.”

At his godparent’s urging Steve ducks into the cushioned seat, which is a novel experience in and of itself, and Howard closes the door behind him.  Steve can hardly believe the comfort of the carriage, and the roominess of the interior, especially considering his much larger frame.   

“The world is at your feet, my dear.  Keep your heart open,” Peggy urges him through the carriage’s window, “And have courage, Steve.”

“I will,” Steve promises, “Thank you, Peggy.”

“Also, very important,” Howard’s face joins Peggy’s in the window, “Our magic won’t last forever.  You’ll return to your old self at midnight, so you’ve gotta be safe at home by then, champ.”

“That’s fine,” Steve agrees.  He clasps both their hands.  “Thank you both.  I’ll never be able to repay you.”

“Just keep being you, kid,” Howard instructs him with a wink, and then Dum Dum is igniting some kind of motor, and the horseless carriage takes off down the lane with remarkable speed.

Once Steve finds his balance, he pokes his head out of the still open window and looks back down the road to his dark cottage and his faerie godparents.  He sees them wave goodbye before vanishing in one last shower of golden sparks.

Steve returns to his seat, marveling at his temporary new body in all its finery.  He takes a deep, clear breath, and that is a miracle unto itself.  Steve grins, and once the shock wears off there’s nothing left in his heart but gratitude and excitement. 

Steve is going to the palace.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And we're off to the ball, where I'll be putting the 'harlequin' in this harlequin romance. I hope you all enjoyed Peggy and Howard with their 1940s anachronisms. Feel free to imagine them in the glamorous Old Hollywood formal wear of your choice.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ten minutes ago, I met you...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whew! Sorry for the delay, but this turned into a monster chapter. I hope it lives up to the wait!

“Sam, dance this next waltz with me, I beg of you,” Bucky entreats his favorite guard, “If one more hoopskirt bangs against my ankle I’m afraid I may scream.”

“Sorry, Highness,” Sam declines, sipping a crystal glass of punch, “I’d prefer to see the evening out without incurring Her Majesty’s wrath, and cutting in to your dance card would definitely fall into that category.”

Bucky groans, cursing propriety and his inability to simply fill up a plate with food and hide away in some quiet alcove until this whole farce is through.  The ballroom is filled every splendor and delicacy, and Bucky hasn’t gotten to actually enjoy any of it.

“I feel as though I have already danced with every eligible woman within a thousand miles,” he grumbles.

Sam winces sympathetically.  “No sparks?”

“I can see many potential friendships,” Bucky admits, recalling some of his more stimulating dance partners, “But I could sooner have romantic chemistry with one of the chandeliers.”

Sam can only offer a friendly hand on Bucky’s shoulder, shielding him from the worst stares of the crowd as he enjoys a few moments of peace before he is whisked away to a new dance partner.  Bucky is miserable at the prospect.  He feels stifled, carefully dressed and gloved to hide his arm, hoping that no one grips his bicep to tight or brushes against him at the wrong moment to feel the metal hidden beneath his coat.  The dishonesty of hiding his injury sits uneasy in his gut, expected as he is to choose a bride this night.  If a platonic spouse is his destiny Bucky would at least have her be able to look at him without pity or disgust.  Had he the courage Bucky would simply shed his pure white gloves, and reveal the steel facsimile underneath.  Alas, in that regard Bucky finds himself sorely lacking.

“Well somebody’s decided to take ‘fashionably late’ to a whole new level,” Sam interrupts Bucky’s melancholy, nodding his head toward the grand staircase.  Bucky turns to see the newcomer, arrived long after even the most dramatic of court ladies, and it is the last sane moment he entertains for the rest of the evening.  Bucky catches sight of the man passing through the ornate double doors and he is lost.

He’s _beautiful_.   Sheathed in velvet deeper than the bluest day lit sky, Da Vinci could not have drawn up a more perfect ideal of manhood.  His golden hair, short but artfully tousled into soft spikes over his brow, shimmers in the light of the chandeliers.  Eyes as blue as his jacket sparkle, his soft pink mouth slack with wonder as he takes in the opulent spectacle of the ballroom.  He’s tall, and well muscled, but he carries himself without any trace of arrogance, as though he were much smaller man.  There is an audible hush in the room as he newcomer reaches the top of the staircase and comes into full view of the other partygoers.

“Who is he?” Bucky breathes, dumbstruck by the sheer magnetism of the man’s presence.  Bucky can hear similar whispers from guests on all sides as they stare along with him.  Bucky has the sudden crazed impulse to somehow shield the man from their gazes, as though he were too pure a vision for the eyes of mere mortals to behold.

“Never seen him before,” Sam admits behind him, “But he’s gotta be royalty.”

Bucky’s mouth is very dry as the man descends the staircase, one scarlet gloved hand gliding down the marble railing.  Bucky’s eyes are glued to the splash of bright red tucked into the man’s azure sleeve.  Large hands, but graceful, with long tapering fingers.  Hands that know how to build, touch and hold, Bucky is certain of it.  He can’t help but imagine those red gloves standing starkly against the ivory of his own coat, maybe gripping his waist, or hurriedly undoing his fastenings.  Would the stranger’s touch be gentle against Bucky’s skin, or forceful and claiming?  Bucky nearly whimpers at the thought.

Sam is not blind to Bucky’s instant fixation, and he quirks a brow, still sipping on his punch.

“Maybe he’ll dance the next waltz with you,” he suggests casually, and _oh_ , Bucky would give his left arm for the privilege, if one could forgive such a tasteless bit of humor.

“What discussion did we just finish having about avoiding my mother’s wrath?”  Bucky asks, yet he is unable to draw his gaze away. 

“What Her Majesty doesn’t know won’t hurt her,” Sam says, “Besides, this one looks like he might be worth it.” Without any further warning his guard gives him a forceful push from behind, and Bucky stumbles forward.  Only a pair of hands at his shoulders keep Bucky from falling flat on his face.  Warm, strong hands, sheathed in scarlet kidskin.  Bucky looks up with a gasp to see the very face of the stranger who had so entranced him, looking at Bucky with slight alarm.

“Are you alright?” The man’s blue eyes are even more devastating up close, filled with concern for Bucky’s wellbeing.  His touch is light, and he drops his hands as soon as Bucky is sure of his footing again.

“I beg your pardon,” Bucky stammers, attempting to regain some propriety after Sam’s abrupt intervention, “I-I just lost my balance, for a moment.”

“It’s no trouble,” the newcomer assures him, “Are you one of the attendants tonight?”

Bucky stares at the man in puzzlement for a few second before his eyes widen in understanding.  He doesn’t recognize him.  Having arrived so late the man missed Bucky’s formal presentation and has no idea that he is talking to the nation’s crown prince.  It’s the first bit of good fortune Bucky has had all night.

“Um, no,” Bucky answers, laughing at the sheer novelty of the situation, “I’m...a guest, I suppose.”

The stranger has the grace to be embarrassed at his mistake, the tips of his ears going endearingly red.

“Sorry,” the man apologizes, “It’s just, you match the decorations.”

Bucky examines his own white silk formal clothes, threaded with silver and adorned with the red star of House Barnes.  In retrospect he is a perfect complement to the ballroom’s ornate drapery. 

“I suppose I have made quite the faux pas in my choice of jacket,” Bucky agrees, still grinning.  The strange prince, for he could only be a prince, dressed so finely, laughs softly as well, and the shy sound makes Bucky’s stomach flutter like the most delicate champagne bubbles.

“I know that you’ve only just arrived,” Bucky continues, “But there is a waltz about to begin, and I wondered if you might honor me with a dance.”

Bucky offers his hand, and the stranger’s expression shifts to one of uncertainty.  Bucky falters, having forgotten to consider one very important factor in his infatuation.

“Unless you would prefer a female partner, of course-“

“No,” the prince interrupts, winding his scarlet fingers through Bucky’s white ones, “No, I would love to dance with you.  But I’m afraid I don’t know how.”

“That’s alright,” Bucky assures him, placing his left hand at the small of the stranger’s back, “I can lead.”

Sharing intimate space required by their position, Bucky can see the subtle flush bloom across his partner’s cheeks, and the effect is breathtaking.  With a disbelieving grin playing at his lips the stranger rests his free hand on Bucky’s upper arm. 

“Please,” he invites, “Lead away.”

 

* * *

 

 

Steve can hardly believe any of this is real.  He’s at the _ball_ , amidst all the splendor of the palace and all the spectacle of the nobility in their fine clothes.  Steve himself is dressed in finery he never could have imagined before this day, and only a few steps inside the door he’s already been swept into the embrace of the most beautiful man he’s ever laid eyes on.  Steve invites the stranger to lead him in a dance, half convinced that he’s still in his bed at home, living out a vivid fever dream.

“Have you ever waltzed?” Steve’s partner asks him as the music swells.  Other couples are beginning to pair up, mostly men and women, but a few same-sex pairs grace the floor as well.

“Once or twice,” Steve tells him, “As a child, standing on my mother’s feet.”

“Then you know the basic step,” his partner guesses, walking with Steve through the simple 1-2-3 motion of the waltz, “That’s the whole thing really, with a few flourishes if we feel up to it.”

“Alright,” Steve agrees, warming to the idea.  He’s never danced in public before, mostly on account of his breathing, but also on account of his never having been asked.  Now that a handsome man wants to dance with him _and_ Steve has the full use of his lungs the activity seems that much more inviting.  Steve finds himself nearly trembling with eagerness for the first real steps.  The anticipation seems to flow freely between himself and his partner, and Steve is nearly hypnotized by the allure of his new acquaintance’s gaze. 

“Can you feel my hand at your back?” his partner checks as sway back and forth, allowing Steve to become accustomed to the rolling steps.

“Yes.”  Steve could hardly forget its presence, firm and grounding yet filling his stomach with butterflies. 

“When you feel my hand pull away, step back,” Steve’s partner instructs, “When I press forward-“

“Step forward,” Steve guesses.

“Exactly,” his partner says with a smile, “Just relax.  We’ll take it nice and slow.”

“I trust you,” Steve says.  To his own surprise Steve finds that he is being honest, and not just polite.  The assurance makes his partner glow, and with a bright flourish from the orchestra the dance begins and they’re off.

As promised, they move in a slow, elegant spiral, his partner gently correcting Steve’s missteps as he learns the footwork.  Steve has a suspicion that they’re only moving at half time, given the pace of other dancers around them, but he’s grateful to be able to enjoy the movements and not merely worry about watching his feet.  His partner moves fluidly, but with confidence, and Steve feels safe in his arms rather than trapped.

“I have to express my gratitude,um…” Steve hesitates when he realizes he doesn’t yet know the man’s name.

“You can call me Bucky,” his partner reveals, and Steve has to laugh at the silliness of the nickname amidst all the splendor of the ballroom.  He winces just as quickly.

“I’m sorry,” he apologizes, “That was rude.”

His partner laughs as well, and Steve is taken by the familiarity of the sound. 

“Don’t apologize,” Bucky insists, “It’s a childish nickname.  I chose it on purpose.  My given name is far too serious.”

“Well, thank you, Bucky,” Steve says, “I would have been lost here, I think, if you hadn’t swept me off my feet.”

Bucky pulls Steve close, and they circle each other, hands joined above their heads.  Being so near Steve can see the exact silver blue of Bucky’s eyes, and silky sheen of his chestnut hair, swept into a low knot at the base of his neck.  Steve has the strongest urge to tug it loose and run his fingers through it. 

“The pleasure was all mine,” Bucky responds, flashing a heart stopping grin before spinning Steve away again. 

Bucky guides him through more complicated swirls and turns, helping Steve back into step with ease the few times they stumble.  With Bucky holding him Steve is eager to glide through the new motions, rather than frustrated by his mistakes.  Bucky is a patient teacher, without a hint of condescension, despite his own evident skill on the floor.  The soft smile never leaves his face, as though there were no greater pleasure than aiding Steve as he fumbles his way through the formal dance.

“Everyone is watching us,” Steve notes, self-conscious for the first time as he carefully follows Bucky’s lead in the graceful waltz.

“No,” Bucky corrects him as they circle the room, “They’re watching you.”

Steve is astonished.  “Why would anyone want to look at me?”

“They’ve never seen you before,” Bucky explains, eyes roving over Steve’s face, “And you also happen to be completely mesmerizing.”

Steve’s eyes widen at his partner’s compliment.  He knows a bright flush adorns his cheeks but he can’t help it, he has no immunity to flattery.  Steve frequently receives praise for his art but never for his body, and certainly no praise so poetic as what flows from his partner’s lips as easily as breath. 

They swirl around the floor, nothing so graceful as the ladies in their full skirts, but to Steve it feels like flying.  He’s hyperaware of every point of contact between the pair of them, from their joined hands to the sturdy curl of Bucky’s bicep under his palm to the shivery good feeling of Bucky’s left hand at the base of his spine. 

Steve is so enraptured that he hardly notices when the music comes to a gentle finale and the other pairs surrounding them begin to disperse.  Bucky has to guide them to a halt.  He removes his hand from Steve’s waist and Steve frowns, still in a pleasant daze.

“Why are we stopping?” Steve asks bemusedly.

“The song is over,” Bucky informs him with mirth in his eyes, “I would invite you for another turn but the orchestra has to take their rest.”

“Oh.” Steve releases Bucky’s hand with regret.

Without the diversion of Bucky’s touch Steve is more aware than ever of the stares from the guests around them.  From noble ladies dripping in jewels to peasant maidens in home sewn dresses, Steve can feel the heat of their gazes.  Expressions flash past Steve’s eyes as Bucky leads him to the edge of the dance floor, mostly curious faces, but more than one disgruntled, and…is that anger?  Why should these people care if Steve and Bucky danced together?  If it truly is only the novelty of his presence, Steve doesn’t care for it.  He shoulders enough whispers and pitying stares when he’s in his own frail body, he doesn’t want them to taint his one night of health and freedom. 

Bucky seems to note the strange atmosphere of the room, as well as Steve’s discomfort under the partygoer’s scrutiny.

“Would you maybe…like to take a walk?” Bucky asks, indicating a nearby doorway, “With me, I mean.  And we could talk for a while, away from all this.”

“Please,” Steve entreats, and his professional curiosity gets the better of him as he continues, “Do you know, maybe, where they keep the paintings?  I’ve always dreamed of seeing the palace’s art collection.”

Bucky eyebrows rise, but his expression is one of pleasant surprise. 

“Come with me,” he instructs with a conspiratory wink.

Bucky leads Steve through the whispering crowds to a rather plain door nearly hidden behind some lush drapery.  There is a guard stationed in front, but he steps aside with merely a nod from Bucky and they pass through into a dimly lit passageway.  Steve hardly has time to puzzle over Bucky’s ease around the palace before his dance partner leads him through the short hallway into a much larger room.  They step into the light, and Steve’s jaw drops. 

“The grand salon,” Bucky introduces with a theatrical flourish.

The room is massive, possibly as large as the ballroom they just left behind them.  Even at his new above average height Steve still feels dwarfed against the salon’s high ceilings, and it seems every inch of available wall space is covered in paintings.  The works themselves disappear into the heavens, the walls reaching higher than the light from the bracketed lamps can reach. 

“Incredible,” Steve breathes, overwhelmed by the walls filled with priceless artworks, “How did you know this would be-“

Steve stops short in front of a large group portrait.  It’s one of the biggest works in the room, clearly intended as a centerpiece of sorts, as it immediately draws the eye with its massive gold wrought frame.  Steve can see it’s the royal family, more from the symbolic props and attire of its figures than any familiarity with their faces, but now that he’s caught a glimpse of her from afar he can see the likeness of Queen Winifred.  The older man in the center must be the late King George, and the newborn infant in the Queen’s arms the princess Rebecca.  But there, on the side, with his left hand on the king’s shoulder… 

“Oh damn, I forgot about that one,” Bucky swears behind him.  Steve realizes why Bucky’s laugh was so familiar to him.

Steve stares at the painted likeness of his new friend, standing in a place of honor behind the rulers of the kingdom.  The place reserved for-

“The crown prince,” Steve concludes, turning to Bucky in shock, “You’re the prince.  Prince James.”

“James Buchanan George Windmere François Reginald Evelyn Albert Barnes,” Bucky introduces himself with chagrin and a short bow, “Which like I said, is a far too serious name for casual use.  I’d much prefer we stick with ‘Bucky’.”

Steve isn’t sure whether he should bow, or genuflect, or do nothing at all and pretend he isn’t standing in front of the crown prince of the realm.  He recalls his earlier fumblings of conversation and his mortification only worsens.

“Oh my god, and I mistook you for a _servant_.”  Steve is certain he could melt into the floor from his own foolishness.

“That’s hardly your fault,” Bucky laughs, “After all, I am dressed to match the table linens.”

“I think it far more likely that the table linens were chosen to match _you_ ,” Steve shoots back, but he has to smile despite the embarrassment heating his cheeks, “And that explains why everyone was watching us dance.”

“It may have been a factor,” the prince admits, stepping closer, “Though you do cut a dazzling figure.” 

Bucky steps closer, his grin fading as he reaches hesitantly for Steve’s elbow only to drop his hand at the last moment.

“I didn’t intend to deceive you,” the prince swears, left hand tucked behind his back nervously, “But when you didn’t recognize me I couldn’t pass up the chance for a few moments of normalcy.  If I’ve made you uncomfortable…”

“No,” Steve interrupts, taking Bucky’s arm, “As I said before, I’ve always dreamed of viewing the royal art collection.  Who else could better serve as my guide?”

Steve waits with his pulse racing.  Sure, they’ve already shared a waltz in a ballroom full of people, but the intimacy required by two dance partners can be excused.  Steve’s touch here in private can’t be excused as platonic.  Bucky’s eyes widen the barest inch, but if he is surprised by Steve’s hesitant advance, he quickly schools himself.

“Who indeed,” Bucky murmurs.  A relieved smile curls the edges of his tempting mouth, and he places his right hand on top of Steve’s where he’s wrapped it around Bucky’s forearm.

Bucky leads Steve around the large room, stopping to offer commentary on a work here and there.  A few times he can tell Steve a humorous anecdote about the subject of a royal portrait, or a piece of trivia about a work’s country of origin.  Bucky is clearly very educated, but there is no arrogance to his dialogue, only enthusiasm for the subject.  Steve finds himself looking to the prince in eagerness for each new bit of information he has to offer.  He’s grateful, given the overwhelming scale of the work on display, to have such a generous docent. 

The paintings on the wall could easily fill an art historical text, with works left for a second volume.  There seems to be at least one representative from every great age and area of painting, from the Classical to the Baroque to the Romantic.  Steve is certain he spots a Raphael tucked between an amorous rendition of Cupid and Psyche and a stern Byzantine icon.    

“I love portraits,” Steve says, eyes roving from one gilt frame to the next in wonder, “Families, workers, old or young.  I love when an artist can capture a little bit of humanity on a canvas.  The more intimate the better.”

“As opposed to historical works,” the Bucky guesses, “You are not stirred by grand scenes of battle?”

“No,” Steve agrees, eyes flicking over one such battlefield scene.  To him the great general in the foreground is eclipsed by the fallen men intended merely as a backdrop.  “I’m afraid years past have caused me to lose my taste for war.”

He can feel Bucky shift uncomfortably beside him, slipping his left hand into his pocket.  Steve looks back to realize the “general” portrayed is in fact the king, and Bucky’s father, who led the kingdom into the Great War all those years ago.  Steve has overstepped himself yet again.

“Forgive me,” Steve stammers, “Your Highness, I-“

The prince’s discomfit fades quickly.

“There’s nothing to forgive,” he assures Steve, “I am no great fan of war myself.  It killed my father, after all, among a few other grievances I bear.”

Bucky’s smile is charming, but there is a tightness to his eyes that Steve has the impulse to soothe with a gentle touch. 

“Mine too,” Steve offers, “My father, I mean.  When I was still a boy.” 

Bucky’s gaze goes soft at Steve’s confession, not with pity, but with empathy.  With this new commonality between them Steve only finds himself drawing closer to the mysterious prince.

“Come,” Bucky encourages with a soft hand at Steve’s elbow, “Perhaps some more pastoral scenes will serve as a balm for us both.  And as I said, please call me Bucky.”

It’s a short walk to a nearby set of double doors, with only a few generous pauses for Steve to admire a few of the more exquisite works.  Steve could probably spend years in this room and never see every painting, but they must continue on to where Bucky promises the best is yet to come.

“Don’t tell any foreign dignitaries,” Bucky advises Steve as they pass through into a smaller, but no less opulent room, “But this is where my mother and I put our favorites.”

“Why would the dignitaries care?” Steve enquires as Bucky lights a few oil lamps, filling the sitting room with warm light. 

“Our sovereign cousins never tire of sending paintings with their ambassadors as ‘gifts’ for the royal family,” Bucky explains, “It’s all very clichéd, but to refuse them would be to insult a potential ally, and so our grand salon grows fuller with every visit.  But every now and then there is a diamond in the rough, and we hang it here, where we might actually get to look at it now and then.”

“It’s a lovely room,” Steve says.  Truly, it is a peaceful space, with blush colored walls and soft Persian rugs covering the floors.  Steve could see Bucky and his mother and sister spending time here, not as royals, but as a family, to read and study or talk of art.  And the art, as promised, has none of the stern grandeur of some of the historical works in the grand salon.  Rather the paintings that Bucky is most eager for Steve to see are gentle landscapes, warm village and country scenes featuring colorful characters, and bright still lifes full of ripe fruit and blooming flora.  The walls here are not stacked nearly so high, but rather the small groupings of images appear to have been much more carefully arranged.  Steve walks with Bucky around the edge of the room, stopping to admire and discuss a particular painting here and there. 

A tall narrow portrait of the Madonna and Child hangs elegantly beside a small but lush banquet table.  A little further down a domestic kitchen scene chats gaily with a misty ocean vista while an oval framed cameo of a young noblewoman watches over them fondly.  Steve is thrilled to see the prince’s tastes so closely aligned with his own when it comes to art.

“They complement each other,” Steve observes, “Some of the pairings are so different, I would never think to put them on the same wall, but together both works somehow become more profound.”

“I’m always rearranging things,” Bucky says, “My lady mother says it gives her a headache, that no painting is ever in the same place for more than a month, but I find it to be a calming pastime.”

“You’re a curator,” Steve tells him, heart glowing warm from their shared enthusiasm.

“An amateur one, at best,” Bucky demurs, “I just love to see how two or three works speak to each other when hung just so.”

“Wonderful,” Steve declares, then asks, “Do you have a favorite?”

“Oh yes,” Bucky answers, “Why don’t you guess?”

Bucky releases Steve’s arm, giving him run of the room.  Steve makes a bit of a show of perusing the walls, hand on his chin as he considers his options.

“Is it this one?” Steve asks, pointing out a small portrait of a toddler Bucky posed with his mother and father.  Bucky laughs.

“An excellent guess,” he answers, “But no.  It’s a nice painting, but I had colic for the sitting of it.  It was a miserable few weeks for all involved.”

Steve winces sympathetically, moving on to the next grouping.

“Maybe this?” he suggests, indicating an exotic desert landscape. 

“No,” Bucky says, following Steve as he circles the room, “But you’re getting warmer.”

“In the room or in the subject matter?” Steve asks, but Bucky shakes his head, miming locking up his mouth and throwing away the key.  Steve is about to give up, but then Bucky’s gaze drops to a far corner of the room.  Certain he’s caught the prince, Steve turns to find the object of his gaze only to have his eye land on a familiar sight, and all thought of the prince’s playful challenge is forgotten.

There, hung just beside a small grouping of comfortable armchairs, where anyone seated would be sure to look upon it, is Steve’s painting.  He’d know it anywhere, though the colors are slightly changed now to his vision.  He’d spent an entire week of April with his easel and palette at the mouth of the shepherd’s valley in order to capture the first bloom of the summer wildflowers.  He’d been in bed afterward for two weeks, having stayed out in the evening mists for far too long in order to complete it.

“This is-“ Steve nearly reaches out to touch the canvas in wonder, “I mean- this small piece.  It’s…charming.”

“It is,” Bucky agrees, beaming at the sight of Steve’s work, “I just recently came upon that one, but already it’s among the most treasured in my personal collection.  I bought it from a doctor in a small village just outside the palace grounds, if you can believe it.”

“How interesting,” Steve says neutrally, “Do you know who painted it?”

“Regrettably I didn’t ask for the artist’s name,” Bucky says with a frown, “Very foolish on my part, for I would gladly be a patron of his work.  He must be a remarkable man.”

“What makes you say that?”

Bucky hums, a furrow of uncertainty in his brow.  “I live a life of privilege here,” he says at last, “As do our sponsored artists and retainers, anyone who lives in the palace really, but I am not blind to the realities of the outside world.”

Bucky nods towards Steve’s painting, stepping closer to brush his fingers against the simple gold frame.

“For this artist to see the world so beautifully,” he continues, “Despite the humility of his surroundings, and the challenges he must face to pursue his craft, why a person like that must be full to the brim of courage.  People like this artist are the ones who bring light to the world, I am certain of it.”

“This painting is your favorite,” Steve thinks out loud, astounded, “Of all the grand works in the palace.”

“Yes,” Bucky agrees, still gazing at the simple oil paint landscape, “Grandeur is easy to come by here, but such a peaceful scene is much more rare.”

They look at Steve’s painting for a few more moments in silence, arm in arm. 

“These works,” Steve murmurs, “I could find inspiration here for years to come.  Even this brief glimpse has me itching to pick up my brush and palette.”

“You’re an artist?” Bucky exclaims, eyes bright.  His excitement is mesmerizing.  It makes Steve’s breath catch in his chest.  “What kind of work do you do?”

“I’ve been told I have a fair hand,” he admits, “I do some oil painting, but mostly drawing with pencil.”

“Would you draw me?” Bucky asks, before wincing, “Oh, no, forgive me.  That’s a horribly cliché thing to ask-“

“No I would love to,” Steve says, “If you can forgive the limits of my skill.  I’m not sure I could do your features justice.”

Bucky practically drags Steve over to a large writing desk, opening drawers and rifling through for a paper and pencil.   He is genuinely eager, not to see his own image, but to see Steve work. 

“I love to watch the court painters,” Bucky confesses to Steve, rolling out a sheet of parchment on the desk, “I know the labors involved are demanding, but to someone like myself with no artistic talent to speak of, what they do is like magic.”

“My mother would say that hard work _is_ magic,” Steve comments, though at the moment the most enchanting thing in the room is inarguably Bucky himself, offering Steve a few pencils and a soft gum eraser.

“Now, how would you have me posed?” Bucky asks playfully, getting into the spirit of the activity, “I could recline on the sofa, perhaps with a rose between my teeth?”

Steve chuckles, though the image Bucky presents draws an embarrassing curl of heat to his groin.

“Um, maybe seated here?” Steve indicates instead, “Just across from the desk, so that I might have a clear view of you from the lamps.”

Bucky drags a nearby armchair to the appointed place, dropping into the seat dramatically.  His limbs are splayed loose like a puppet with cut strings.

“Arrange me as you see fit,” Bucky invites, eyes twinkling. 

Steve could think of several arrangements in which to put the prince, none of which would be appropriate for polite company.  He settles for sitting Bucky up straight, propping his head up on one hand to imitate a thoughtful pose.  Though he could simply instruct Bucky of his desired position verbally, Steve takes the prince at his word and places each limb with a careful touch.  He lifts Bucky’s left hand into place, and presses his shoulders back in order to straighten his spine.

Perhaps most daring of all, Steve rests two fingers just under the cleft of Bucky’s chin, guiding the prince’s gaze just over Steve’s shoulder.  A moment of hunger overtakes him, and Steve find himself leaving his hand against Bucky’s jaw just a few seconds longer than strictly necessary.  From the heat of the prince’s gaze Steve knows his moment of weakness is no secret.  Steve clears his throat and quickly steps away, returning to the objective safety of the desk.

“There,” he says, keeping his voice light as he picks up his pencil, “A well known artist’s trick.  For the easiest portrait, always aim for a three quarter’s view.”

Bucky winks at him, still held in his pose.  “I’ll take the secret to my grave,” he vows before his eyes flick back to their intended position and Steve begins to draw.

Steve keeps his lines light and graphic for the sake of efficiency, though if he were afforded the opportunity he’s certain he could spend hours rendering every slope and shadow of the prince’s face.  He begins with the shape of Bucky’s eye, quickly framed by the arch of his brow and the bridge of his nose.  Through his supposed lens of artistic observation Steve can look his fill of Bucky’s features, so masculine and strong but graced with stunning touches of delicacy.  Along with the heroic angle of his jaw Steve dedicates a few moments to the soft bow of the prince’s lips, and the rich shadow of his dark lashes against the paleness of his cheek.  The architecture of Bucky’s face takes shape in only a few minutes, the room comfortably silent but for the shirring of Steve’s pencil and the quiet rhythm of their breath.

Steve blocks in the most basic form of Bucky’s hand and shoulders, eager to add detail to the prince’s face.  Bucky’s gaze has shifted slightly, to the corner where Steve’s painting hangs.

“You know,” Bucky muses, carefully keeping his pose for Steve’s eye, “I’ve been thinking of having a less formal portrait done.  Just of me and my sister, maybe.  I’d like to have some memento of her infancy for when we are both grown and married.  I wonder if I were to seek out that artist he might allow us to sit for him.”

Steve does his best to keep his hand steady despite his disbelief as he sketches in the thick wave of Bucky’s hair.  “I’m certain he would be honored,” he says, “Such an opportunity for a common painter would be-well, it would change his life.”

“His work deserves to be seen,” Bucky murmurs, eyes fixed on Steve’s painting, “If doing my portrait would make it so then I must commission him.”

Steve uses the flat edge of his pencil to add a soft shadow below Bucky’s jaw before he sets his implement down, satisfied.  It’s not his finest work, but his subject is plain to see, and there are some nice moments of shading and highlight, to be certain. 

“It’s as finished as it can be,” Steve informs Bucky, “Would you like to see?”

“Oh yes,” Bucky enthuses, like a child at Christmas as he leaves his post to come around the desk and peer at Steve’s work. 

“Incredible,” the prince breathes, leaning over Steve’s shoulder to trace the delicate pencil lines, “In a few strokes you’ve captured me more truly than any of these stiff court paintings.”

“Hardly,” Steve demurs, “I’ve barely any training, unlike the men who paint in your court.”

“Still, I prefer it,” Bucky declares, “You have an astounding talent, though you flatter me.  My visage is not so handsome as your hand has portrayed.”

 “I find it so.”

The words thoughtlessly escape his lips and Steve pales.  Bucky’s fingers freeze where they ghost across Steve’s drawing, but his other hand only tightens on his shoulder.  Bucky’s cheeks are flushed when their eyes finally meet again, and he bites his lip before speaking.

“Would you-“ Their faces are so close as to be nearly touching, and Steve is dizzy with it.  “Would you care to see the garden?  It’s beautiful in the starlight, and we could be guaranteed our…privacy.”

Steve can’t be imagining the bare longing in Bucky’s gaze, and he swallows, warmth stirring in his belly as he takes the prince’s offered hand.

“I would like that very much.”

Bucky leads him through a set of double doors and onto a terrace, their hands still joined like lovers. 

“This way,” Bucky urges, as they descend a few marble steps and step onto a moonlit path hedged with lilac and hydrangeas.  With the sight and perfume of the flowers filling his senses, Steve feels as though the air itself is full of magic.  Bucky leads him around a corner, along a tall hedge, and then Bucky is opening a small gate and ushering Steve through into a hidden alcove.  The space is small, but welcoming, with a lush green lawn and a mature willow tree standing tall in the middle of it, its elegant tresses hanging in gently waving curtains of foliage. 

“A secret garden,” Steve marvels.  Dense hedges guard the sanctuary from unwanted eyes, with red and gold flowers dotting the border, all glistening in the twilight.

“You could call it that,” Bucky says, grin going nervous, “I spent a lot of time playing here as a child, when my parents had to entertain the more serious guests.  It’s one of my favorite places.”

“It’s beautiful.”  Steve almost feels like an intruder in the sacred space, but Bucky pulls him in further, into the dappled shadows of the willow.

At the base of the tree sit a few comfortable pieces of furniture, draped in oil cloth to protect them from the morning dews.  Bucky pulls the drop cloth from a cushioned chaise, inviting Steve to sit with a shaking hand.  Steve perches on the edge of the large seat, eyeing the prince’s tremble with concern.

“Are you alright?” Steve asks. 

“Yes,” Bucky says hurriedly, clenching the fingers of his left hand, “No.  Maybe?  I don’t-“

Steve reaches out, taking the prince’s white gloved hand between his two red ones.  Steve’s touch seems to calm him, and Bucky ceases his shaking after a few moments. 

“Please,” Steve requests, stroking his thumb across the back of Bucky’s hand, “Tell me what’s troubling you.”

Bucky shakes his head with a smile.  “Your patience,” he muses, gazing down at Steve in wonder, “You warm the soul like the softest candle flame.”

Steve has no response to Bucky’s endearment.  With his stomach fluttering pleasantly he urges Bucky to continue.

“I confess,” Bucky admits, sinking to one knee at Steve’s feet, “I did not show you this place with chaste intentions.  But with the coolness of the night air my boldness has left me, and I fear…that is I-I am afraid-“

Steve stops the prince’s anxious words with a soft hand to his cheek.  He can feel the warmth of Bucky’s breath through his glove.

“What are you afraid of?” Steve asks, and Bucky sighs, turning his face into Steve’s scarlet palm.

“Duty,” Bucky mutters, “And rejection.  But you…I do not even know your name, and yet I find myself inspired in your presence.”

Bucky’s gloved hands fall to Steve’s thighs and the light touch may as well be electricity for the sparks it sends skipping over Steve’s skin.  He has never known a man’s touch so intimately, yet with all his heart Steve wants _more_.

“My mother always said that we must have courage,” Steve breathes.  He’s certain he must be drowning out the music in the grand ball room with the thudding of his heart.

“Oh?”  Bucky’s starlight eyes have dropped to Steve’s mouth.  He wets his own lips and Steve thinks he might die of the sight. 

“Yes,” he manages, “She said…she said ‘magic follows courage’.”

“Magic,” Bucky repeats, “How wonderful.”

The softest smile crosses the prince’s features before he leans up and presses his lips to Steve’s own. 

At his touch Steve nearly expects another shower of gold sparks, as though this moment were another faerie spell, but no.  There is only the velvet press of Bucky’s mouth to his; the heady warmth of the prince’s breath against Steve’s cheek.  Steve’s eyes flutter closed and touch becomes his primary sense.

Bucky kisses him, meeting his lips again and again in the softest dips of pressure.  Only a few of these precious intimacies exchanged between them and already Steve feels drunk.  Effervescent.  Bucky’s grounding hold on Steve’s thighs is surely the only thing tethering him to the mortal plane. 

 “Is this,” Bucky ventures, lips still touching Steve’s cheek, “Is this alright?  Do you want-“

“Yes,” Steve breathes, pulling Bucky’s left hand against his heart so that Bucky can feel its racing beat, “Oh yes, please.”

Bucky sighs happily, taking Steve’s mouth again.  This time Steve presses back, using the hand still cradling Bucky’s cheek to urge the prince up onto the chaise with him.  Both seated, Steve can wind his arms around Bucky’s neck, threading his fingers into the prince’s thick hair as he pulls him in, hot and eager.  Bucky’s hands slide up Steve’s hips until they can fit into the natural dip of his waist, petting over the velvet covered skin enticingly.  He coaxes Steve’s mouth open, teasing at Steve’s bottom lip with his tongue until Steve grants him entrance.  Their mouths slant together, and the next few minutes are silent but for heavy gusts of breath and stifled moans of bliss.

Steve fears he could melt away from the molten heat of their embrace.  Camaraderie and affection have flowed into passion and he feels as though his beating heart is laid bare for Bucky’s taking. 

“Oh, _oh_ ,” Bucky whimpers into Steve’s mouth, hands skimming over his sides, “How can I even begin to worship you?  Please, tell me what I must do, what you need-“

“Everything,” Steve says, thoughts scattered with his hands buried in the prince’s raven hair at last, “Anything, with you.”

“I’ll find us a bed,” Bucky vows, “Or an altar.  My god, we could be married before the sun rises.”

“No!” Steve exclaims, clinging to the prince’s jacket front, “I mean-let’s just stay here, for now, please.”   

Bucky’s suggestion is a splash of ice water in the heat of Steve’s belly.  To be wed to this vision of a human being, only for the clock to strike twelve and Steve return to true form, frail and sickly. 

“I meant no disrespect,” Bucky stammers, brow furrowed in concern. 

“I took none,” Steve assures him.  The barest brush Bucky’s hand across his groin is enough to feel urgency of Steve’s ardor.  “I-I simply wasn’t finished being kissed, yet.”

Bucky’s brow smoothes and his eyes sparkle.  He brushes his lips against Steve’s, the barest touch. 

“Somehow I already feel as though I will never be finished with kissing you,” he confides against Steve’s mouth.

At the slightest urging from Bucky Steve gladly reclines against the high back of the chaise, making room between his thighs for the prince to follow.  Despite the cool night air Steve is soon warmed by the press of Bucky’s body against his own.  With their hips flush there is no hiding their desire from one another and their kisses grow more urgent with the knowledge. 

Their lips are parted and slick, and Bucky’s mouth grows sloppy against his own.  Eventually Bucky’s kisses miss Steve’s mouth altogether, his lips grazing Steve’s cheeks, then his jaw, then the taut skin of his neck.

Bucky devotes whole minutes to the column of Steve’s throat, covering the virgin territory with wet, open mouth kisses while Steve can only tremble and moan.  He noses at the space left inside Steve’s collar before sucking at the skin there, nipping with his teeth to leave a bright red mark. 

Steve cries out from the sweetness of the pain.  His arousal throbs between his legs, and he turns his face away only to have the prince guide him back into another ardent, intoxicating kiss.

“Do not hide your pleasure from me,” Bucky entreats, when they manage to part for breath, “You are exquisite.  Beautiful.  Never in my life have I beheld someone so breathtaking.”

Steve is gasping, panting as he clasps Bucky’s face between his palms. 

Bucky’s hair has fallen loose from its careful knot and it falls in soft waves around his face.  His lush, kiss swollen mouth is nearly so red as to match Steve’s gloves, and his hooded blue eyes glow silver in the dappled moonlight.  It’s an image Steve will carry in his heart forever.

“I could draw your face a thousand times,” Steve proclaims breathlessly, one red thumb tracing over Bucky’s cheekbone, “And never tire of its likeness.”

Bucky makes a wounded sound before crushing their mouths back together.  It’s rough and graceless, their bodies tangling on the chaise as Steve learns the shape of Bucky’s mouth, the slope of his shoulders, and the long muscled expanse of Bucky’s back.

Bucky’s right hand pets down Steve’s chest, bypassing the fastenings of his jacket to smooth over his belly and cup his hardness over his snug trousers.  Steve moans even as he flushes from the obscenity of the touch.  He’s never known anyone’s hand but his own, and Bucky’s in particular threatens to overwhelm him.

“ _Please_ ,” Steve entreats.  What he is begging for he can hardly say; only that he never wants the prince’s hands to leave him.

“Anything, my darling,” Bucky promises.  Steve clutches at Bucky’s back so fiercely he is certain the grip of his fingers must be painful, but Bucky only groans as he drags his hand over Steve’s arousal over and over.  Steve’s eyelids flutter and his breath is ragged against the prince’s mouth.  He could weep for want of that suggested bed.

For the first time in his life Steve wishes to know the touch of another man’s bare skin against his own.  Bucky weight presses him into the cushioned chaise and more than anything Steve wants him to push harder, put him on the flat of his back and _take_.  Steve would have Bucky’s sweet devotions whispered in his ear while the prince moves inside him, holding him close as they tenderly make love.  

“Your name,” Bucky pleads, between wet, searing kisses, “Please, I must know to whom in this short time I have already devoted my soul.”

In the throes of ecstasy Steve’s resolve is weakened, and he parts his lips to reveal himself when a resounding _bong_ echoes through the garden, sending a shiver through the gentle bows of their guardian willow tree.

The first stroke of midnight is upon them.

Upon hearing that unwanted bell Steve is seized by panic.  He shoves Bucky back, palm flat against his chest, breaking them from their decadent repose.  The prince yields with a sound of hurt disbelief, bracing himself to keep from tumbling off the chaise.  Steve stares down at Bucky, heart in his throat.  The prince is a vision of debauchery, hair mussed and suit rumpled, and the very idea of leaving him when they were so close to the climax of their passions threatens to break Steve’s heart in two, but the midnight bell tolls, and his faerie godparent’s spell is about to be broken.

“I’m sorry,” Steve breathes, chest still heaving, “I have to go.”

“What?” Bucky stammers, “ _No-_ “

The second clang of the bell hits them, and it moves Steve to his feet.  He has only moments to escape the palace walls and return to his carriage before his comely façade melts away and Steve is left in his own ailing body once more.

“Wait,” Bucky objects, catching hold of Steve’s jacket sleeve, “What’s going on?  Why are you leaving?”

“I can’t stay,” Steve responds, edging towards the garden gate, “I wish I could, truly.”

“I don’t understand,” Bucky insists, eyes wet with Steve’s rejection.

“My moments here were numbered from the beginning,” Steve tells him, “And my time is spent.  I’m sorry.”

“Is it something that I’ve done, or said?  If I have been too forward, on my _knees_ I beg your forgiveness,” Bucky implores him, and Steve can’t leave the prince behind the taste of guilt in his mouth.  He turns, and pulls Bucky into his embrace one last time. 

“Never,” Steve whispers, “I would gladly return every affection you have spoken ten-fold.  I could spend years, a _lifetime_ , doing so, but you have been deceived, for I have no life to give.”

“Don’t leave,” the prince begs him, “Please.  Whatever it is you speak of, I can help you.  I will move the heavens and the earth-”

Steve dips down the short distance to press their lips together in one final, chaste kiss.

“I’m sorry,” he says into Bucky’s soft dark hair, “But if you knew what I truly am you would not feel the same way.  For your sake I have to go.”

“I love you,” Bucky whispers fiercely.  His hold is desperate, but even with his faerie godparent’s magic waning Steve is still the stronger of the two and he pulls away.  Only Bucky’s left hand will not release its grip, and Steve has to tug his fingers free, leaving one scarlet glove behind in the prince’s heartbroken grasp.

Steve stumbles back through the gated hedge and he races through the garden as the third toll of the bell resonates in his very bones.  He can still hear Bucky’s shouts behind him, but Steve is already through the terrace doors.

He pauses only to swipe his earlier drawing of Bucky from the desk in the grand salon.  There’s not a second to lose, but Steve can’t leave without some memento of this night, and the prince whose touch has changed his life forever.  Steve clutches the rolled parchment to his chest as he rushes back down the dim hallway and back into the splendid chaos of the ballroom. 

There are cries of shock and distress as Steve barges through the crowds, hurried apologies on his lips.  With the lateness of the hour the revelries in the ballroom have reached cacophonic levels, and the noise and brightness after the stillness of the garden leave Steve dizzy and disoriented as he struggles across the floor to the foot of the grand staircase.

If he didn’t already know that Peggy and Howard’s magic was fading, it is painfully evident when Steve reaches the top of the stairs wheezing.  His lungs are painfully tight, and his jacket already feels looser around his shoulders.  The fifth clang of the bell, muffled by the thick palace walls, nonetheless makes Steve’s heart pound with fear.

At the top of the stairs Steve finds his way blocked by a mass of red silk.  It is the Queen herself, dressed to complement her royal son in an elegant crimson gown.  Steve, in his haste, has stumbled into the middle of her entourage, and he can see several guards reach for their weapons.  Queen Winifred halts them with the smallest motion of her hand.  Steve can see much of Bucky in his mother’s face, but queen carries herself with an indomitable air of nobility that the prince, in his youth, has yet to achieve.  Steve is standing before the ruler of his kingdom, and he is in awe, despite the urgency of his exit.

“Your Majesty,” Steve says breathlessly, bowing over the Queen’s hand even as color begins to leech from his vision, “You have raised a remarkable son.”

If the queen gives him any response Steve can’t hear it as he turns and runs again, leaving her on his left side, whose ear has returned to its familiar dull ringing.

Steve leaves the ballroom behind, counting on Bucky’s mother to delay him in his pursuit.  At the entrance to the palace Steve can see his horseless carriage waiting with Dum Dum in the driver’s seat, honking some kind of horn impatiently.  He runs as best he can with his breath still coming in pained bursts and tumbles into the backseat of the strange carriage, tugging the door closed behind him.

“Please, Dum Dum,” Steve urges his driver, whose whiskers are already lengthening as the seventh gong rings out, “Get us as far as you can.”

“Buckle in, sir,” Dum Dum orders, ears growing pointed and furry as he slams his foot on the gas pedal and they charge out of the palace gates.

They leave the palace and the tolling bell in a cloud of dust, but Steve knows they have only minutes before the spell is shattered and their coach returns to its pumpkin origins.  Steve’s suit is darkening, and the soft velvet going rough against Steve’s bare left hand until he’s once again wearing his father’s suit, and his own worn black boots.  Steve is sinking into the carriage seat as he loses muscle mass and height. 

They zoom down the road at impossibly speeds, the carriage roaring like an angry beast as they follow the twists and turns back to Steve’s village.  A ride that would have taken a horse and rider a half hour takes Steve and Dum Dum only a few minutes, though Steve is certain he is going to have a heart attack before they reach their destination what with the recklessness of his cat’s driving.

A new terror strikes Steve in short order, as he realizes the carriage is beginning to shrink around him.  The golden car is about to turn back into a squash, going who knows how fast along a rough road with Steve and Dum Dum still trapped inside.

“Stop Dum Dum,” Steve cries, pushing against the caving ceiling, “Stop!”

Dum Dum’s answer is only audible as a feline yowl but there is a screeching grind of metal and rubber and the carriage skids to a halt on the muddy dirt road.  The doors are sealing over as the walls of the carriage become squishy and organic, but Steve throws all his weight against them and they burst open.  Steve is roughly deposited into the mud, and not a moment too soon, for when he turns back to look his once magnificent carriage is a lumpy garden pumpkin once more, only now broken into pieces from their rough stop.   

Peggy and Howard’s magic is well and truly worn out.  Steve gets to his feet carefully, head congested and woozy again, and does his best to brush the mud from his knobbly knees.  His fine clothes are vanished, along with his handsome body.  He stands alone on the country road save for a ragged tomcat and a splattered pumpkin.

Steve could almost imagine the whole night never happened, but for the red kid skin glove adorning his right hand, which still clutches the rolled sketch of the crown prince.  Steve silently thanks his faerie godparent’s for allowing him this one remnant of their spell before he begins to take real stock of his surroundings.  It’s cold enough for Steve’s teeth to chatter despite the late summer season, and he sneezes, wincing at the jab of pain to his sinuses.  

Thankfully, when Steve’s eyes adjust to the dark evening, he realizes the woods fields around him are familiar, and with a gush of relief he realizes he can make out the faint shadow of his own cottage at the top of the next hill.

“That’s a blessing, at least,” Steve says, only to curse as the heavens open and a cold downpour unleashes itself upon his head.  Hurriedly he stuffs his drawing down his shirt, protecting it from the bitter rain beneath his thick felt jacket.  His father’s coat, still stained with milk and several sizes too large, is at least somewhat waterproof.  Steve knows he’s wrinkling the parchment, but better a creased drawing than a sopping wet one. 

Dum Dum, fully returned to his feline form, mewls miserably as he attempts to find shelter under the broken remains of the pumpkin carriage. 

“Come here, boy,” Steve coaxes, kneeling down to hold open his jacket, “There’s plenty of room, and it’ll keep you mostly dry, at least.”

Dum Dum eagerly curls into the crevasse of Steve’s coat, and Steve hurriedly does up as many buttons as he can, holding his cat and his portrait of Bucky safe against his chest as he stumbles, shaking and sneezing, the last few hundred yards to his front gate.

When Steve finally latches the door to his family’s cottage, he is chilled to the bone, and his breath rattles in his lungs.  He sinks to the ground, pulling his limbs in close to try and cease his shaking.

Dum Dum wriggles out of Steve’s jacket and shakes out his damp fur before planting himself on Steve’s chest, curling into a ball and purring fiercely.  Steve still shivers uncontrollably, but his friend offers at least some warmth, and it eases Steve’s lungs enough to cease his panicked wheezing. 

“Th-thank you, old f-friend,” Steve manages to stammer through his chattering teeth.  He curls around Dum Dum, sick and exhausted, and yet smiling, for when he closes his eyes Steve can still see the bright swirling color of the ballroom, the warm lamplight of the grand salon with all its beautiful works of art, and most of all a cool, starlit garden where Bucky showed him what it was to be loved.

With his drawing safe inside his coat and one scarlet glove still fitted to his hand, Steve falls into a fevered, restless sleep.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay! As I said on tumblr it's been a killer week at work, but now I'm back! Hopefully I'll be posting the last few chapters of this work much more quickly.

_Knock knock knock._

“Steven?  Are you in there?” 

Steve wakes with a gasp to a sharp rapping on his door.  He sucks in air but it feels as though he were breathing through the width of a river reed.  Steve exhales and it comes out as a cough that squeezes his chest and burns his throat. 

_Knockknockknockknock._

“Connie says you missed the carriage last night.  Are you alright?”

Dr. Erskine is banging on the door Steve is currently sprawled against.  The vibrations pound against his sinuses like grapeshot.  Dum Dum’s ears flick back in displeasure where he’s still curled up next to Steve on the floor. 

“I’m here,” Steve tries to call, but the words only escape his throat as a rasping wheeze.  His normally low voice is like gravel when he gives another attempt.  “Just…just a second.”

Steve tries to stand, but his legs feel like jelly.  He’s still wearing his father’s uniform, soaked from last night’s rain and weighing him down like a lead blanket.  The best he can do at the moment is scoot out from in front of the door, reaching up with a trembling limb to unlatch the door and allow his friend entrance.  Dr. Erskine nudges the door open, still waiting for Steve to answer.  His eyes drop to where Steve is lying against the wall and the doctor visibly pales.

“Steve-Oh my god,” Erskine exclaims, dropping to his knees in front of Steve and pressing a hand to his fevered brow, “What happened?  You were not so ill when I saw you last.”

“I was getting sick yesterday,” Steve wheezes, vision swimming, “Tried...tried to make the carriage anyway.  Got c-caught in the rain.”

Steve bites out the white lie.  It’s true enough, and he’s in deep enough trouble without his friend thinking he’s hallucinating about faeries and magic as well.  A small, jealous part of him also wants to keep the memory for himself.  Steve earned that night, and now he’s going to pay for it.  It’s for the best that what transpired remain between him and Bucky.

The doctor sighs at Steve’s admission.  Erskine takes Steve’s pulse, his fingers at Steve’s pale, limp wrist.

“I feared as much,” Erskine mutters after he’s finished, offering Steve a hand up, “Come.  We must get you out of these clothes and into a warm bed.”

With the doctor bearing most of his weight Steve is able to stagger to his feet without fainting, but it’s a close thing. 

“Slowly,” Erskine urges, “You don’t need a concussion in addition to your cold.”

“I’m alright,” Steve insists, even as spots darken his vision.  The doctor huffs as they cross into Steve’s tiny bedroom. 

“There are many adjectives that describe you at the moment,” Erskine informs him, peeling the damp jacket off of Steve’s spindly frame once he’s safely seated on his thin mattress, “’Alright’ is not one of them.  This could be very serious.”

To his alarm when Erskine removes Steve’s jacket he inadvertently sends the drawing of the crown prince tumbling to the floor.  Steve tries to retrieve it but Erskine stops him with a scowl and with a groan bends down to grab the rolled parchment himself.

“Please,” Steve entreats, reaching out for the drawing, “Please don’t look at that.  It’s…personal.” 

The doctor gives Steve a peculiar look, but he does as he asks, setting the drawing down carefully on the stool that serves as Steve’s bedside table.

“Lay down before you fall down,” Erskine urges him, turning his back so that Steve can shuffle out of his damp trousers and into a loose nightshirt.  Even that much activity has Steve exhausted, and he’s out of breath by the time he finally lies down against his thin stack of pillows.  He carefully tucks his remaining red glove under his pillow and out of the doctor’s sight.

From somewhere Dr. Erskine has pulled his stethoscope, the looping device made from carefully pressed tin and expensive rubber that he uses to hear Steve’s lungs. 

“Breathe in.”

Steve doesn’t need the doctor’s earpiece to hear the fluid causing his breath to bubble and wheeze.  He can feel it, like his father’s wet jacket is still pressed against his chest, holding his lungs tight and small.

“Again.”

Steve obeys, even though the slow breaths are making him lightheaded.  Dr. Erskine’s expression only grows more solemn as he listens at several points along Steve’s chest and back. 

“My boy…” Erskine is trying to keep a brave face, but Steve can see the grief already hiding behind the doctor’s spectacles.  It is the same grieved gentleness that Steve remembers from his youth, with the doctor at his mother’s deathbed.

“It’s okay,” Steve mumbles, eyes fluttering, “It’s okay.  We knew this day would come, Abraham.”

“No,” Erskine growls, tucking blankets up to Steve’s chin, “That is unacceptable.  You have your whole life ahead of you.”

“I have lived… enough.”  Already Steve is being pulled back into sleep.  His limbs feel as if they were made of lead.  Steve fixes his eyes on the rolled portrait of his dear prince.  “More than m-many will ever know.” 

Dr. Erskine speaks again, but Steve is already dreaming.

 

* * *

 

“So you’re not going to pursue him,” Sam says, leaning against a palace balcony, “You’re not even gonna try?”

Bucky runs his fingers through his hair distractedly. 

“How can I?” he asks, kicking at a nearby suit of armor, “He ran away from me, without even telling me his _name_.  And even if I could find him, what then?  I am not free to offer myself in marriage.”

“You thought he was in some kind of trouble,” Sam reminds him, “Don’t you want to know he’s alright, at least?” 

“I am afraid,” Bucky confesses, perching next to his guard, “That if I found him I would never be able to leave his side, regardless of the queen’s orders.”

“Who says you’d have to?” Sam suggests, “You’re gonna be king eventually.  In my book that gives you a vote.”

“Your Highness?”  A servant interrupts them with a short bow.  “Her Majesty would speak with you at your earliest convenience.”

“Certainly,” Bucky agrees, “In the small salon?”

“In her bedchamber, your Highness,” the servant answers, “She has been in with the doctor this last hour.”

“And now she would speak with me,” Bucky surmises, stomach twisting anxiously, “I’ll go there now.  Thank you.”

The servant bows and scurries away.  Bucky looks to his captain.

“I’m sure it’s nothing,” Sam assures him, “But you should go.  If you change your mind about your prince you know where to find me.”

“Thank you, Sam,” Bucky says before hurrying through the grand halls to the royal suite. 

Bucky arrives just as the doctor is finishing with his mother.  Queen Winifred is in bed, bundled up in silk sheets and brocade comforters despite the mild weather.  She doesn’t look particularly ill, just pale and a little worn.

“Mother?  What’s all this?” Bucky asks as he watches the solemn doctor pack up his black case, “Has something happened? Are you-”

“I’m not dying, boy,” Queen Winifred informs him, to Bucky’s immense relief, “Just worn out.  I’m too old to be out all night at parties.”

“But you’re alright?” Bucky inquires, sitting on the edge of his mother’s bed so that he can take her hand in his own, “It’s nothing serious?”

“Only the coming of old age,” his mother says dryly, reclining against her pillows with a weary sigh.

“Old is hardly the word to describe you,” Bucky retorts, “Though if you’re not ill, why did you summon me?”

The queen sighs again, though this time it’s a less tired and more chagrined. 

“To admit defeat,” she succumbs, “I saw you last night, my dear, and I met your mysterious prince.  It would seem my attempts to marry you off to a suitable woman have backfired spectacularly.”

“You saw me?” Bucky asks, flushing. 

“Only on the dance floor,” the queen assures him with a wink, “Though don’t think I didn’t notice when you squirreled yourselves away.  I’d never seen you so happy, James.”

“I’d never been so happy,” Bucky says, “Not since before the war, at least.”

“Mm,” his mother agrees, “And when I met your young man it was plain he felt the same.  I knew then that I was beaten.”

“You know that I was willing-“ Bucky attempts, though the idea of marrying another having held his beloved in his arms makes his stomach turn.

“I know,” his mother murmurs, holding tight to Bucky’s left hand, “But this life has already cost you too much.  I was wrong to ask more of you.”

“Mother-I-“

“No,” the queen urges, “You were right.  Our kingdom needs stability, but stability cannot come from a king who is divided in his own heart.  You must be yourself, James.  If that leaves your sister as your heir I am at peace with it.  With her brother’s guidance I am certain Rebecca will be a fine queen one day.”

Bucky’s throat tightens as he presses his mother’s hand to his face. 

“My Queen,” he whispers, “Mother, you have given me the greatest happiness this day.”

Queen Winifred smiles, reaching up to stroke through Bucky’s hair as she did when he was a child.

“Maybe it’s not what your father would have wanted,” she says, “But he is no longer king.  You are, or you will be soon, anyway.  Now go find that boy who’s left you so enchanted.  I imagine he’s missing his glove terribly.”

“I never told him about what happened to me,” Bucky whispers, wiggling the fingers of his left hand in his mother’s grip, “I did not have the courage to reveal myself.”

“Find the courage now,” The queen urges him, “If he is the man you say then he will love every part of you, as you love him.”

“As always, you are right,” Bucky says, bending down to kiss his mother’s cheek before leaving the Queen to her rest.  Sam is waiting for him outside.

“Everything alright?” Sam asks.  Bucky claps his friend on the shoulder with a grin.

“Everything is wonderful,” Bucky tells him, “And we have a new mission.”

 

* * *

 

_Hear ye, hear ye!_

_With the blessings of Her Royal Majesty Queen Winifred Anastasia Rebecca Juliana Margaret Antonia Frances Josephina Barnes,_

_His Royal Highness Crown Prince James Buchanan George Windmere François Reginald Evelyn Albert Barnes hereby declares his love to the blue eyed prince who attended the palace ball wearing scarlet gloves, and his intentions, should he be amenable, to join with said prince in the most sacred and holy sacrament of matrimony._

_If he is free and willing to do so, the object of His Highness’s most ardent affection may present himself at the palace forthwith, bearing the right handed scarlet glove that he wore during the palace festivities._

_Any subject of the kingdom, noble or commoner, who can offer information as to the mysterious prince’s identity or whereabouts should make themselves known, and they will be rewarded handsomely._

_Long live the Queen!_


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The red badge of courage...

Steve awakens.  It’s a slow, reluctant process, accompanied by bleary vision and ragged, shallow breath. 

“Good morning, Steven.”

Dr. Erskine looks _tired_.  Steve has no doubt he’s sat up all night these last two days at Steve’s bedside.  At least, any time Steve wakes up the doctor seems to be there with a cool cloth and a glass of water ready. 

The doctor is not offering Steve a sip of water now.  As Steve turns his head to peer over at his friend the room spins nauseatingly.  When his vision settles Steve can see Dr. Erskine is looking down at something in his hands.  Something that appears a dull red to Steve’s poor eyesight.  With a start Steve sticks his hand under his own pillow to find his glove is vanished.  Vanished into Dr. Erskine’s gentle grip.

“I just heard the most fascinating announcement made in the village square,” Erskine remarks, “The crown prince has declared his love for a young man he met at the ball.  It’s all the gossip around town.  Can you guess the description of that young man?”

Steve looks away, studying the worn edge of his bed sheets.  “He looks nothing like me.  Of that I’m quite certain.”

“ _Au contraire_ ,” Erskine disagrees, fiddling with the glove in his lap, “There were only two distinct characteristics that the prince’s messenger felt were important to relay.  One, that the prince’s beloved has blue eyes.”

“There were many men at the ball with blue eyes,” Steve attempts, but the doctor only hums. 

“Yes, that’s true, very true,” Erskine agrees, “But the second characteristic was much more distinct.  Apparently, the young man wore scarlet gloves.  Very unusual, given the current fashions.  Singular, in fact.”

“Where did you find that?” Steve asks, nodding toward the red glove in the doctor’s hands.

“I was adjusting your pillows while you slept,” Erskine reveals, “I thought that changing the covers might help your airways, and there it was.”

Steve looks to his bedside table.  His drawing of Bucky is unrolled and on display.  Steve’s skill has betrayed him.  The prince’s likeness is unmistakable.  The evidence piled against him is damning.

“So,” the doctor continues, a twinkle in his eye despite his haggard air, “How was the ball, my boy?”

Steve looks anywhere but at Dr. Erskine, caught out in his fib. 

“It was magical,” Steve admits at last, a reluctant grin playing at his dry lips, “Literally, Abraham, it was the most magical night of my life.”

“I knew it!” Dr. Erskine declares triumphantly, “The minute I found the glove I knew it was you.  How did you do it?”

“Would you believe me if I said I had two faerie godparents?”  Steve asks, “I swear, it is not delusion.  They made me healthy, and sent me to the ball in a magic carriage.”

“I believe you, certainly,” the doctor says, “I may be a man of science, but magic is certainly not outside my theatre of comprehension.  No, my boy, you have been blessed.  We must send word to the palace!”

At the doctor’s words Steven goes cold.

“Out of the question.”

“What?”  Erskine is genuinely shocked.  “No.  We must tell the prince at once.  Take you to the palace, even.  As soon as possible.”

“I can’t even leave this bed,” Steve snaps, “I could hardly walk to the palace and announce myself.”

“The prince has doctors and resources better than any I could provide,” Erskine urges, “He would not doubt you.  I need only take this glove to one of his men-“

“No,” Steve commands, “You mus- you _mustn’t-“_

Steve’s objection is interrupted when he loses his breath to a long, wet cough.  Erskine helps him to sit up, rubbing his back until Steve can pull a shallow sip of air into his lungs without choking. 

“He cannot see me like this,” Steve entreats, blinking tears from his eyes, “Not after the man he met because of faerie magic.  Bucky-the prince deserves more than the half-life of illness and bed rest I can offer him.”

“You are more than your conditions, Steven,” Erskine says, “If his Highness cannot see that then he would not deserve the sacrifice you are making for him.  You will _die_ of this, my boy, if we cannot find you better care.”

“Please,” Steve begs, clutching the doctor’s sleeve, “I will not trade my health for his happiness.  You must promise you will not seek out the prince with this knowledge.”

“But-“

“ _Promise_ me, Abraham.”

Dr. Erskine sighs deeply, but he nods his assent.  Steve relaxes then, collapsing back onto his pillows with relief.

“Was it worth it?”  The doctor offers no judgment, only curiosity.  Steve smiles despite his aching joints and swimming vision. 

“Yes,” he says, holding the scarlet glove close to his heart, “A thousand times over, and I wouldn’t change a moment.” 

 

* * *

 

 

“This seems a frivolous errand,” Bucky grumbles as Sam reaches forward to pull the bell cord of Abraham Erskine’s office.  They are back in the village, seeking out the artist of Bucky’s recently purchased and much beloved painting. 

“If you want to go back to the line of ‘princes’ waiting for you at the palace, be my guest,” his guard offers.  Bucky shudders at the idea.  At first his summoning to all the local villages and neighboring kingdoms had seemed romantic, but in retrospect he may have been overzealous in beginning his search.  Within hours there had grown a crowd of blue eyed men, young and old, with red gloves dug out of charity bins and stolen from their mother’s closets, all clamoring at the palace gates.  After three days of fruitless search Bucky has only heartsickness as his reward.   

Sam as always, takes note of Bucky’s downtrodden spirit. 

“Buck up,” he encourages, smirking at his own pun, “He may well be waiting for you when we get back.”

“If only, Sam,” Bucky muses, straightening as they hear rustling from the other side of the door.  A few moments later the door opens to reveal a very surprised doctor.

“Prince James,” Dr. Erskine exclaims.

“Um, yes?”  Bucky likes to pretend he isn’t hung up on propriety, but it is shocking to hear himself so informally addressed by a practical stranger.  “Dr. Erskine, pardon me for calling without notice, but you may recall I bought a painting from you a short time ago-“

“Oh yes, yes, Your Highness,” the doctor crows, “I prayed and prayed that you would come.  I did not seek you out, and my promise is kept!”

Sam steps forward, subtly moving in front of Bucky, but the prince sees no light of madness in Erskine’s eyes, only relief and joy. 

“What promise is this, doctor?” Bucky asks, “We came here to ask-“

“You seek the blue eyed young man from the ball,” the doctor guesses, “The one who wore red gloves?”

“What?  No-well, yes,” Bucky admits, “But I came here to find the identity of the artist who made the painting you sold me some time ago.”

“Then I can aid you on both counts,” Dr. Erskine reveals, “For the two men are one and the same!  Your lover is sleeping in a cottage not even a half mile from here.”

“You know him?” Bucky asks.  Even the last three days of heart break cannot stop the blossoming of hope.

“His name is Steven Grant Rogers,” Dr. Erskine reveals, “He has been one of my patients since he was a child.”

“You’ll forgive us, doctor, if we ask for some proof,” Sam entreats, the voice of reason on Bucky’s behalf, “It has been a long three days of false leads.”

“Of course,” Dr. Erskine says, “That glove you have tucked into your belt?  I have its brother.”

From the pocket of his jacket Erskine draws a slip of scarlet kidskin, and Bucky’s breath catches in his chest.  The doctor offers Bucky the glove for his inspection, but the prince already knows it is a pair with the glove at his belt. 

“How did you come to possess this?” Bucky asks, holding the matching gloves side by side.

“I took it from him while he slept,” the doctor confesses, “May god strike me down, but as the Lady Rogers used to say, sometimes we must make our own magic, and Steven was adamant that you not know his true identity.”

“He-“ Bucky’s heart is breaking all over again.  “He did not wish for me to know him?  Then he does not love me.”

“He does,” Dr. Erskine declares, putting on his coat and hat, “Your Highness, believe me when I tell you he loves you far too much for his own good.  Now we must set off, there’s not a moment to lose.”

Bucky’s extra guards follow behind them as they make their way out of the village and down a dusty lane.  It’s a nice day, and with the promise of his love at the end of the road Bucky’s feet hardly notice the hard packed earth. 

Steven Grant Rogers.  When Bucky closes his eyes he can still see his face, clear as day.  The name fits.  Noble, but plain.  A whole sound in the mouth without any extra flourishes.  Bucky catches himself sounding it out silently as Erskine directs them to a small cottage with an unkempt garden.

Just outside the cottage door, Erskine gives pause. 

“I feel I must…prepare you,” the doctor warns, “Steven is very ill, and he may not look like the man you met.”

“Ill?” Bucky asks, fear clutching at his breast, “What kind of sickness troubles him?”

“Asthma,” Erskine says, “Which I fear has led to the touch of pneumonia after he was caught in the rain the night of the ball.  I found him three days ago collapsed, and he has only worsened since then.”

“That is why he did not seek me out,” Bucky guesses.

“Steven has lived his life trying to avoid being a burden,” the doctor agrees solemnly, “He is prepared to succumb to his illness rather than weigh you down.”

“Then he is a fool,” Bucky declares, “Though a courageous one, to think my love so shallow.  Lead the way, doctor.”

Dr. Erskine nods, before turning an iron key in the front door and ushering Bucky inside, with Sam close behind. 

The inside of the house is close and cluttered, a small kitchenette to the side with a few pieces of furniture to make a living room.  Closed doors presumably which led to bedrooms.  Everything is coated in a fine layer of dust. 

“I know Steven would beg your forgiveness for the state of the place,” Erskine notes, leading them to one of the closed doors, “He normally keeps and exceptionally clean house.” 

“I can reassure him later,” Bucky murmurs, waiting with trepidation for Erskine to open the door. 

“I left him sleeping only an hour ago to get some more supplies,” the doctor explains, “I doubt he has moved since.”

“Should I let him sleep?” Bucky asks, but the doctor shakes his head. 

“I think it is very important that you wake him,” Erskine says, “He won’t last much longer without a reason to live.”

“I will do my best to give him one,” Bucky vows. 

Expression growing solemn, Dr. Erskine opens the door to reveal a small bedroom, and Steven Grant Rogers. 

The room could hardly be ten paces long, and most of the space is taken up by a bed.  It’s more of a cot, really, but it has more than enough room for the figure that occupies it. 

The first feature that catches Bucky’s eye is a shock of golden hair.  Morning light streams into the room and catches on it.  It’s tufty and bed mussed, but still Bucky could hardly forget its silky feel between his fingers. 

“It’s him,” Bucky declares, with a relieved exhale.  With his certainty Bucky finds the courage to drop his eyes further. 

It’s not quite the same man, that much is clear.  Bucky’s prince was tall and broad, while the man sleeping is slender, and his feet barely reach the end of the small mattress.  He is pale, frighteningly so, but his face is the same despite his changed frame.  Bucky remembers the shape of that mouth against his own, and the curve of his jaw held in his hand.  Stemming from the sleeves of his threadbare pajamas are familiar hands.  Hands that know how to touch, build, and hold, Bucky is certain of it.

When a breeze flows through the open window it flutters a piece of parchment on Steven Grant Roger’s bedside table.  Bucky recognizes his own portrait, slightly wrinkled but unmistakably the same sketch drawn on the night of the ball.  This young man is, without a doubt, Bucky’s prince.  Bucky could sing with joy even though he trembles in fear for his love’s health.

“He looks so different,” Bucky breathes, “And yet he is just the same.”

“Go in, and speak to him,” Erskine urges, “Though if he doesn’t recognize you, do not take offense.  I have lost him to delirium more than once in the last day.”

“Is it so serious as that?” Bucky asks.

“I love him as my own son,” Dr. Erskine confesses, “But there’s nothing more in my power to help him.”

“I should have been here sooner,” Bucky curses himself fruitlessly, “Sam-“ 

“I’ll call the carriage,” Sam assures him, heading for the door, “And send a messenger back to the palace.  The doctors will be waiting for you.”

“Thank you, my friend,” Bucky tells him before stepping further into the bedroom.  With a weak heart Bucky approaches his beloved’s bedside. 

“Steven?”  Bucky asks.  The name feels strange on his tongue. 

“Steve?”  That feels better.  Bucky dares to reach out and stroke his fingers across the man’s cheek.  Even small and pale in sickness there is no doubt that this is the same prince that Bucky held in the gardens of the palace.  “Steve, my love, can you hear me?”

For a few seconds Steve is deathly still, and then…

“Bucky…” A smile curls the edges of Steve’s full pink mouth.  Eyes flutter open, bluer than the softest Daylit sky.  Bucky gasps, dropping to his knees at Steve’s side.

“Yes, darling,” Bucky says, brushing the sweaty hair from Steve’s forehead, “I’m here.”

“Then I have arrived in Paradise at last,” Steve breathes, with a sigh of relief that threatens to shatter Bucky into pieces.

“Not quite,” Bucky corrects him, “Though it is heaven to be reunited with you.”

Steve’s gaze sharpens on Bucky’s face, and he seems to absorb his surroundings at last.  “You’re here,” he observes, voice rough and worn, “In my cottage.”

“Yes, and to be honest I’m a little put out,” Bucky says, “That you would die here nobly and leave me to suffer in my loneliness.”

“Abraham,” Steve complains, looking to the doorway of his bedroom where the doctor keeps careful watch, “You _promised_ -“

“The good doctor did not break his vow,” Bucky interrupts, “Though heaven knows god would have forgiven him for it.  I sought him out.”

“Why?” Steve asks.

“Would you believe I was looking for the artist we discussed, on the night of the ball?” Bucky answers him, “I should have known you would be one and the same, since I loved both painting and prince from the moment I saw them.”

Steve’s face falls, and Bucky is torn with guilt for causing it.

“I am no prince, Your Highness,” Steve reminds him, “Only a poor artist, without even his good health to redeem him.  The man you knew was only the product of enchantment and illusion.”

“And your skill at painting?  Is that also faerie magic?” Bucky asks, rising to sit on the edge of Steve’s bed, “Or your intelligent conversation?  Or your compassion for your fellow men?  I know my own heart, Steve, and I am not so blinded by a pair of broad shoulders that I could throw away my love for a man who would die to protect my happiness.”

Steve opens his mouth, perhaps to protest, but all that emerges is a wracking cough.  The force of it curls Steve forward, and Bucky has to brace him lest he tumble right off the thin mattress.  

The coughing fit is long, and wet, and terrifying.  Bucky is powerless except to watch and stroke his love’s hair as Steve chokes until his lips go pale and his body shudders. 

Thankfully it only lasts a few moments.  Steve is eventually able to take a breath, shallow but steady.  His tense frame relaxes against Bucky’s own, and Bucky’s own heart beats again.  After a few breaths Steve releases his white knuckle grip on Bucky’s coat with an apologetic grimace.

“I’m s-sorry,” Steve wheezes, as Bucky carefully lays him back against his pillows.  Bucky is able to fetch him a sip of water from a glass on the side table, which Steve accepts gratefully.  “I know how scary that is to witness.  I’m sorry.”

“Hush, my darling,” Bucky urges him, “It will be my pleasure to care for you, now and forever.”

“But how can you make such a vow?” Steve asks, eyes streaming from the force of his fit, “Now that you see who I am, you, who are _perfection-“_

Bucky laughs, only to keep from weeping. 

“I am the _farthest_ thing from perfect,” he cuts Steve off, and with a stuttering heart Bucky pulls the leather glove from his left hand and pushes up his sleeve, revealing his steel and clockwork limb for his lover’s eyes. 

“It turns out we both put on a charade of perfection that night,” Bucky confesses, holding out his prosthetic for Steve’s judgment, “I lost my arm when I was barely out of childhood, in the last battle of the great war.  We had declared peace, and so I was allowed to visit my father on the battlefield.  There was a-an ambush and I…”

Bucky’s words fail him, as they still sometimes do when speaking of that dark day.  Steve looks upon him only with compassion.  He reaches out with a trembling hand until their fingers touch, flesh and metal.  Steve examines the limb curiously, from the smooth steel palm to the complicated wrist and finger joints.  He winds their fingers together, squeezing tight.

“Can you feel-“

“Only pressure,” Bucky explains, watching Steve’s fevered eyes skim over their joined hands, “And extreme temperature.”

Steve says nothing else, just continuing to manipulate Bucky’s prosthetic like a painter posing his model. 

“It’s warm,” he says at last, expression unreadable.

“Yes.  If it disgusts you, you need not feign otherwise,” Bucky offers, throat tight, “I will not abandon you, whatever your feelings-”

“It’s beautiful,” Steve rasps, tracing the delicate whorls of metal, “It is a work of art.  Just as you are.  Why have you ever bothered to hide it?”

“How could I reveal myself?” Bucky asks, “Who would want a broken king?  Or a broken husband?”

Steve scowls.  “Stop saying that,” he orders, “There is nothing broken about you.”

Bucky shrugs weakly.  “I’ll agree to that when you offer yourself the same kindness, darling.” 

 “Bucky…”  Steve’s voice is weak, but his eyes are bright with humor.  With a trembling hand he traces the curve of his prince’s cheek, the soft bow of his bottom lip.  Bucky’s eyes burn as he beholds his love, so sick and yet filled with so much strength.  Steve smiles when Bucky takes his hand and kisses it. 

“I love you,” Steve declares, “I don’t want to leave you alone in this world.”

Bucky smiles.  “Then you shan’t,” he says, pressing Steve’s hand to his heart, “After all, what is a little force like Death to defy your will?”

At that moment the captain of Bucky’s guard bursts in.

“Buck,” Sam interrupts them, seeming to have forgotten decorum at last, “We’re ready to go.”

“Thank you,” Bucky says again before turning to Steve, “This is it.  Will you come with me, now?  Will you let your life be entwined with mine, forever more?”

Steve’s breath is coming shallower, and his eyes flutter, but his smile only widens.

“Five minutes or fifty years,” Steve replies, “I’m yours, my love.”

Bucky lifts Steve from the bed in a bridal carry, blankets and all.  Steve curls his face into Bucky’s neck, and the prince marvels at how miraculously they fit together, even more so now than the evening they first met.  The faint warmth of Steve’s breath against his skin threatens to weaken Bucky at the knees, but he stays strong.  There is not a moment to lose if Steve is to be saved.

“Doctor, you must come as well,” Bucky entreats he carries Steve back across the cottage’s threshold, “You know him best.  You’re knowledge may save him yet.”

“Of course,” Dr. Erskine agrees, closing Steve’s door before following Bucky out to the waiting carriage.  The doctor climbs up front with the driver while Bucky lifts Steve into the backseat with Sam’s help.  His captain gives Bucky a hand up and closes the door so the carriage can pull away, bound for the palace. 

In the cool darkness of the rocking carriage Bucky arranges his beloved on the cushioned seat, cradling Steve’s head in his lap and tucking his blankets closely around his shivering limbs.  Steve falls into a fitful sleep, his eyes shadowed and his skin frighteningly pale.

“Stay with me,” Bucky pleads, pressing his lips to Steve’s golden hair, “My True Love, stay with me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Will STeve die of pneumonia before he and Bucky can be married and live happily ever after?!?!? (Spoiler Alert: He doesn't :p)


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wedding bells are ringing...

_My True Love…stay with me…_

_There there, my darling…you mustn’t give up so easily…_

_C’mon kid…it ain’t over ‘til it’s over…_

_My brave boy…you have magic yet to bring to the world._

_Your story doesn’t end here._

* * *

_Six Months Later..._

 

“Steve?  Are you ready?”

“Nearly,” Steve calls to the voice on the other side of his dressing room door.  He smoothes the front of his wedding suit, tugging at his sleeves self consciously despite the perfect fit.  The beautiful white silk coat was made for him, fitted from scratch as soon as Steve was well enough to stand for the measurements.  It’s a handsome suit, and Steve dares to think that he feels very handsome wearing it.  The slim cut complements his slight limbs, rather than fighting them, and the gold thread and buttons bring out the shine in his hair and make his eyes sparkle.  Steve slips fresh white gloves onto his hands, and the look is complete.

The door opens, and Steve is pleasantly surprised to be greeted not by the servant who had been helping him get ready, but by his prince, already dressed and decorated for their marriage only a few minutes away.

“Buck,” Steve exclaims as Bucky wraps his arms around Steve’s waist and steals a kiss, “What are you doing back here?”

“I couldn’t stay away,” Bucky murmurs, pressing a kiss to Steve’s temple, “You look so beautiful.”

“I could say the same of you, and more,” Steve replies, his fiancé resplendent in navy blue velvet, with sterling fastenings to match the silver circlet nested in his hair, “Though you know we aren’t meant to see each other until we meet at the altar.”

“Mere ceremony,” Bucky demurs, “We are already lovers.  You could hardly ruin my virtue before we reach the vicar.”

“You raise a fair point,” Steve admits, cheeks pinking at the thought of he and Bucky’s lengthy and passionate intimacies, “Which I should remind you means there’s no pressure for tonight.”

“No pressure,” Bucky agrees, admiring Steve’s fine figure in the full length mirror, “I am merely going to pleasure you as no man has ever been pleasured before.”

“Save it for the marriage bed, my love,” Steve teases, leaning his head back to press a kiss to the underside of Bucky’s chin, “We have a very formal and lengthy reception ahead of us yet.”

Bucky sighs.  “Too right,” he admits, “At least the ceremony is as we wished it.”

“Give or take a few hundred extra guests,” Steve chuckles, leaning back against his future husband.  The pair of them in the mirror does make a striking image, Steve all in white and gold like a comet across Bucky’s starry night sky.

“I feel silly in this crown,” Bucky remarks, nodding to the silver at his brow, “Though I suppose you will have one to match it soon enough when you are crowned my prince today.”

“Prince _consort_ ,” Steve corrects him with a lascivious wink.

“You love to remind me of that,” Bucky says with a smirk, “It does make you sound very exotic and mysterious.”

“Fitting adjectives to describe me,” Steve deadpans, and Bucky laughs out loud.  The sound is just as enchanting as the first time Steve ever heard it, listening through Dr. Erskine’s parlor door.

“I love you,” Bucky whispers, once their laughter has settled, “So very, very much.”

“As I love you,” Steve says, concerned at his prince’s change in humor, “What’s the matter?”

“Nothing.  Only, we are about to enter a life together,” Bucky says, eyes growing solemn, “A life that will be followed by a never ending parade of decorum and royal fanfare.”

“I know that,” Steve replies, “I am ready for it.”

“I know you are,” Bucky says quickly, “I just mean, no matter what happens, from this day forward we are married.  You will be my husband, and I would stand with you as an equal, no matter what etiquette and heraldry might try to dictate otherwise.  You must believe me when I say there is no title, or duty that could supersede my love for you. ”

Bucky’s earnest words warm Steve’s heart, and he turns so he might clasp his prince’s face between his gloved palms.  Steve leans up to close the inches between their height and press his lips to Bucky’s in a soft kiss.

The moment their lips touch both men are blinded by a wave of gold sparks.  Bucky jumps, but Steve is calm as the cool sparkles swirl around them.  By now he is familiar with the feel of magic.

When the sparks fade Steve looks to his hands with a grin.  His white gloves are bright scarlet, just as they were the night of the ball when Bucky and Steve first kindled their love. 

“What on earth?” Bucky exclaims.  His circlet has been woven through with a wreath of snow white stephanotis and bright green ivy.  Likewise a spray of blossoms have pinned themselves to Steve’s breast, serving as an impromptu boutonniere.   Steve laughs, fixing Bucky’s circlet until it settles into his hair like a proper flower crown.

“It’s a blessing,” Steve explains, showing Bucky his red gloves, “From two very good friends of ours.  They must have liked your speech.”

 Bucky brings Steve’s scarlet fingers to his lips, pressing a kiss to each hand.  “Marvelous,” he declares.

Outside in the grand hall music begins to play. 

“The guests are arriving,” Bucky realizes with a pout, “I must away, before we are caught and my mother is scandalized.” 

Steve leans up to leave one more chaste peck on Bucky’s lips.  “In only a few minutes we will be together again, never to part.”

Bucky’s smile is beatific.  “Right you are.  I will be waiting for you at the altar,” he says, eyes sparkling, “I’ll be the one next to the vicar looking terribly handsome.”

“Off with you,” Steve chides, sending his groom on his way with a pat on the behind.

Left alone, Steve takes a moment to admire himself anew.  The red of his gloves is as striking now as it was against sky blue the night of the ball.  

“Thank you Peggy,” Steve murmurs, certain of his friends’ presence, “And you as well, Howard.  I’ll never be able to repay your kindness.”

There is a beat of silence, in which Steve can nearly imagine the laughter of his godparents as they scamper off, wedding presents safely bestowed.

“Are you ready to proceed, sir?” Comes the call from outside.  Steve can hear the music shifting from pleasant chamber music to more sacred overtures.  Steve gives himself one final onceover, but there is nothing amiss.  He is completely at home in his clothes and his body. 

“I’m ready,” Steve answers, and without another look back he leaves the room to meet with his prince at last.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For anyone wondering about the meaning of the flowers in Bucky's wreath:  
> stephanotis- marital happiness  
> ivy-faithfulness
> 
> I have a lovely (read:sexy) epilogue to come!


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Happily ever after...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Friends, thank you for joining me on this romantic ride! I had so much fun tapping in to my inner fairy tale lover. I hope you enjoyed Prince Bucky and Cinderella!Steve as much as I did. As promised, here's some happy sexy times with our OTP. This scene takes place about a year after Steve and Bucky were married.

“Steve…”

A warm pair of lips presses to the curve of Steve’s shoulder where his nightshirt has been pulled askew in slumber.

“My love, it is time to greet the dawn.” 

Steve grumbles, curling further into the warmth of his lover’s side.  Prince and palace artist Steve may now be, but a morning person he is not. 

Steve’s prince, now king, on the other hand, is rejuvenated with the rising of the sun, and he doesn’t hesitate to share his early morning energies.  As Bucky strokes his cheek Steve can admit that if he must be awoken before their breakfast bell, this is not an unpleasant method.

“Light of my life…”

“Prince of my heart…”

Steve’s cheeks hurt from trying not to smile at Bucky’s increasingly ridiculous pet names.

“Heritor of my soul’s _devotion-_ “

“That one seems a bit much,” Steve chides, his charade of sleep lost to amusement at his husband’s antics.

“Impossible,” Bucky replies, “There are not words enough in the collective human psyche to encompass our love.”

“Very nice,” Steve deadpans, “You should write cards for St. Valentine’s.”

“You wound me, darling.”

A cheeky hand skitters under the edge of Steve’s nightshirt, teasing up the inside of his thigh before Steve can smack his hand away with a yelp.

“Hm,” Bucky hums, smug, “It would seem you are awake in all the ways that matter.”

“I am now,” Steve shoots back, opening his eyes reluctantly, “Seeing as my husband is so frisky this morning.”

One he blinks the sleep from his eyes Steve cannot regret his decision to greet the waking world at last.  Bucky is a sight to behold in the pale morning light, naked as the day he was born but for their ivory silk bed sheets draped across his middle.  He always sleeps bare, not being concerned with catching a chill in the night as Steve still is.  Steve would be jealous, but a naked husband first thing in the morning leaves room for all sorts of happy possibilities.  This fine morning finds Bucky looking particularly debauched, his hair mussed out of its loose bun and his chest still littered with Steve’s love bites from the night before. 

“You inspire me,” Bucky murmurs, eyes dancing as he takes Steve’s hand in his metal one, kissing his knuckles, “I can’t afford to waste even one minute of daylight spent in your presence.”

Steve feigns irritation, covering his face with his pillow to hide his grin, not to mention his flush as a healthy thread of arousal curls in his belly. 

“You should spend the daylight running the country, your Majesty,” Steve rumbles, attempting to burrow back into their lush covers. 

“There is _always_ time to lavish attentions on my dear husband,” Bucky admonishes him.  He makes a line of brief, wet kisses up the delicate line of Steve’s exposed wrist.

“When the nation collapses around our ears they will call you James the Lovesick,” Steve tells his husband, squirming from the ticklish touch of Bucky’s lips.

“James the Romantic,” Bucky corrects, “And his husband Steven the Adored.  We will be beautiful, tragic figures in song and story.”

Steve pokes his head out from beneath the feather down pillow, looking to his prince with a furrowed brow. 

“Tragic?” he inquires.  Bucky nods solemnly.

“Alas, Prince Steve will die too young,” Bucky intones with a melodramatic hand to his brow, “From being made love to _so_ ardently that he simply melts away into the bed sheets.”

Bucky punctuates his tale of woe by rolling on top of Steve and pinning him beneath his weight, grinding their arousals together until Steve’s indignant squawks have petered out to breathy moans.

“You villain,” Steve whines, eyelids fluttering as Bucky peppers him mercilessly with kisses, endearments dripping from his tongue like honey.

“My darling.”  Bucky presses a kiss to Steve’s sleep mussed hair.

“My sweet.”  One to his smiling mouth.

“My love.”  One to the fluttering pulse at the hollow of his throat.

Bucky is hard and waiting against his thigh, and Steve would love nothing more than to have that hardness pushing inside him, but he cannot resist teasing his husband, just a little more. 

“Perhaps we should stop, then,” Steve suggests, halting Bucky’s hands where they tug at the hem of his night shirt, “If I am doomed to such a tragic end surely it would be better to cool our passions?”

Bucky pauses nosing at the open collar of his shirt to look at Steve with a wicked grin.

“But how could we deny ourselves such pleasure?” he asks innocently, “No, my love.  We must have _courage_.”

Steve rolls his eyes, but he cannot keep the ecstasy from his lips as Bucky slips a hand under his night shirt to stroke his erection.

“ _Oh_ ,” Steve exhales, gasping at the pleasure of his husband’s hand, and his lips back at his throat, “I fear I will meet my demise following my own advice.”

Bucky sits up on one elbow to gaze down on him, angelic in his beauty.  He presses the gentlest kiss to Steve’s mouth. 

“Never,” he promises.

Bucky sucks wet kisses across Steve’s collarbones and down his chest.  Steve’s ribs are not nearly so visible, nor his belly so concave as it was a mere twelve months ago.  Bucky drags his lips over each developing swathe of muscle with relish as Steve squirms, at once pleased and self-conscious.

“You have come so far,” Bucky breathes, reverent as he kisses Steve’s well nourished stomach, “I know how hard you have worked, and here you are, the picture of health and strength.”

 “Not so strong as I was,” Steve mumbles, looking away, “The night we met.  And I never will be again.  It still doesn’t bother you?”

“Your packaging is inconsequential,” Bucky answers him, nosing at the fine gold hair beneath Steve’s navel, “Though your ethereal form would move me to write poetry, had I the talent.  It’s you I love, Steve, whatever magic transforms you.”

“So you never wish-“

“A long and healthy life with you is miracle enough,” Bucky says, “I won’t tax the faeries for any more wishes on our behalf.”

Steve smiles.  A year of marriage and he is still plagued with moments of self-doubt.  Fortunately his husband never tires of reassuring him. 

“Besides,” Bucky informs him with a dreamy grin, “Your most enthralling features have been the same all along.  Your eyes, for example.” 

Bucky leans up to drop a kiss on each of Steve’s eyelids, feather light.

“Your warm, expressive hands.”  Bucky drags the aforementioned appendages from beneath the covers, kissing both of Steve’s palms before encouraging him to twine his fingers in Bucky’s long silky hair.

“And who could forget,” Bucky says with a mischievous quirk of his brow, “Your perfect cock.”

With that declaration, Bucky dips his head beneath their bedclothes.  With flesh and metal hands holding his hips in place Bucky takes Steve into his mouth and proceeds to suck all reason straight out of his head.  The tight, wet heat around his cock threatens to overwhelm his senses.

“Oh god, oh _Buck-_ “ Steve hides his face in the fluffy mass of their down comforter to suppress an embarrassingly wanton moan.

“No,” Bucky commands, releasing Steve from his mouth to scold him, eyes dark and cheeks flushed, “Do not stifle yourself.  I will hear every love sound it is within my power to draw from you, beloved.  I will covet every one. ”

At the riveting heat of his husband’s gaze Steve releases a passionate cry so loud he is certain the noise has scattered the birds off the palace lawn.

“Sweet music,” Bucky declares, and returns to his labors. 

Bucky’s mouth is red and his lips stretched obscenely around Steve’s cock.  He pulls Steve deep into his throat only to back off and suck wet kisses up and down the length of him, eyes hooded and chin shiny with spit.  Steve isn’t small.  His manhood was always the one part of his body well suited to a larger frame and when they first became lovers Bucky found himself choking more than once.  Fortunately with all their practicing Bucky’s mouth has grown skilled, and too soon Steve is pushed to the very edge of bliss.

“Stop, _stop_ ,” Steve pleads, tugging on his husband’s thick locks.  Bucky obeys, looking to Steve with concern. 

“Are you alright?” he asks, one broad palm sweeping over Steve’s chest, no doubt to check Steve’s heartbeat through his thin night shirt. 

“I am well,” Steve assures him, taking a deep, clear breath, “Extremely well.  It’s just…I would sooner wait to reach my climax.”

 _Until you are inside me_ hangs unspoken between them, and Bucky’s expression shifts from worry to hunger in the span of a heartbeat.  Steve’s shirt has officially become an obstacle to their desire, and Bucky helps him pull it up over his head.  He tosses the garment aside and reaches to their bedside vanity for the bottle of viscous oil they require for their copulating.  It’s still open and waiting from last night’s lovemaking, when Steve had teased Bucky with his fingers until his husband had come shaking and moaning into Steve’s mouth.  

Bucky works his way down Steve’s body languidly, bottle in hand.  Steve lets his thighs fall open, eager, but his husband is distracted by Steve’s bared chest, pausing to lave his tongue over a newly exposed nipple. 

“Buck,” Steve demands, spine arching under the teasing pleasure of Bucky’s tongue.

Bucky rolls the opposite nipple between two metal fingers.

“Patience,” he coaxes, sinking lower to press one more kiss to the head of Steve’s cock.  He tips a puddle of oil into the palm of his right hand, spreading it over his fingers for Steve to watch, mouth watering.  Finally Bucky dips his fingers between Steve’s thighs, slipping behind his arousal to reach Steve’s most personal space.

Steve loves the touch of Bucky’s fingers inside him.  It’s intimate, somehow even more intimate than the act of love itself.  The fires of passion blur the more mundane details of their bodies, lost to feeling and instinct.  But here, now, Bucky is careful.  Almost tortuously slow he prepares Steve for the joining to come, working him open with gentle twists and scissors of his right hand.  Bucky peppers him with kisses, over his groin and his midsection, always pausing to suck him into his mouth for a moment when the stretch and strain of his fingers causes Steve’s erection to flag.

“Love of mine,” Steve breathes when most of the discomfort has faded, and he finds himself pushing against Bucky’s fingers, eager for more, “I’m ready for you.”

Bucky hums as he pulls off Steve’s cock, his grin rakish as he gives his fingers one more devious flex inside of Steve.  Steve moans and Bucky only grows more smug, climbing back up Steve’s slight frame to press a kiss to his mouth. 

“And I for you,” Bucky replies when they part.  Steve rolls his hips up until he can feel Bucky against him, hard and waiting.  Their lips meet again as Bucky pours more oil, slicks himself, and then there is pressure and the exquisite burn of Steve’s prince easing inside him. 

Their mouths don’t part until Bucky is fully seated inside him, when they break apart to pant and adjust.  Bucky’s breath is hot against the side of Steve’s face, his eyes squeezed shut to stave off his climax as he in confronted with the delicious clutch of Steve’s body around him.  Steve equally is overwhelmed, every sense eclipsed by his husband inside him, over him, covering his body with his own.  Steve has the taste of Bucky on his lips and the sharp scent of him in his nose, not to mention the heat of him against his skin and the stretch of him where they’re joined. 

“Oh _fuck_ ,” Steve curses as Bucky shifts inside him, pain dissipating into shivery pleasure.  Bucky laughs in between biting kisses laid across Steve’s throat.

“I love it when you swear,” he murmurs, sucking a mark just behind Steve’s ear.  Steve moans, dragging his blunt nails down his husband’s back.

“I only swear in bed,” Steve pants, wrapping his thighs around Bucky’s waist. 

“Mm,” Bucky agrees, drawing his hips back before grinding deep into Steve’s body, “Dr. Pavlov would likely be able to tell us the connection.”

Steve can only shudder and moan as he begins to rock into Bucky’s lengthening thrusts, tugging his husband’s hair again to demand a greedy kiss.  Bucky is only happy to oblige, and they spend the next few minutes in a haze of sweat and lust and devotions. 

Steve tastes the salt of his husband’s skin as he sucks a dark and satisfying bruise into the side of Bucky’s throat.

Bucky grunts at the sharp nip of Steve’s teeth against the spot.  “The courtiers will see that,” he murmurs into the crook of Steve’s neck, still thrusting earnestly.

“Let them see,” Steve growls as he digs his heels into the small of Bucky’s back, urging him to thrust harder, “You’re _mine_.”

Bucky moans, lifting Steve’s hips to change the angle where they’re connected, and his next push lights Steve up from the inside.  Steve’s back arches and he writhes against his pillows as Bucky makes passionate love to him.

“Darling,” Steve pleads, hands wound tight in his sheets.  His pleasure is only heightened when Bucky hears his plea and wraps his metal fingers around Steve’s cock, pumping eagerly.  The smooth steel is slicked by the oil between Steve’s thighs, not to mention the pearly liquid dripping from the head of his cock. 

Bucky pounds into him, stripping his cock and dropping kisses on Steve’s slack mouth.

“Come,” Bucky entreats, “Come for me, my love.  Oh, _Steve_.”

Bucky moans brokenly into Steve’s neck as he stills, his hand still massaging Steve’s erection.  That rhythmic pressure combined with the shudder of his husband inside him as he reaches his climax pushes Steve over the edge, and he comes with a cry of delight. 

Steve’s journey down from the heavens is a leisurely one.  When he descends back to the mortal coil he finds himself pinned beneath his lethargic husband.  Bucky is nestled into the curve of Steve’s shoulder, mumbling happily and pressing fumbling kisses anywhere his mouth can reach.  Steve sighs, blissful, and strokes his fingers through Bucky’s sweaty hair. 

“My love,” Steve hums eventually, pressing his lips to his prince’s crown, “It’s time to greet the dawn.”

Bucky nuzzles against Steve’s throat stubbornly.  “Five more minutes,” he entreats.  Morning person or not, Bucky is no more eager than Steve to leave the peace of their marriage bed.

Steve is more than happy to acquiesce to his husband’s desire, but only moments later the clock tower bell chimes.  The sound is muffled by thick castle walls, but its toll is nonetheless audible.  The morning is well and truly upon them.

Bucky groans, rising up on his elbows to look down on Steve with a pout. 

“I suppose I will have to rule the nation today after all,” Bucky laments, though at the edge of his frown there is the beginnings of a teasing smile.  Despite the weight of responsibility, Steve’s husband is a good king.  History may someday deem him a great one. 

“We could always summon your mother back from retirement,” Steve suggests, which makes Bucky laugh.

“I believe we would have to storm the dowager palace,” he replies, dipping in to give Steve one final, passionate kiss, “No, I believe you and I shall have to face our duties on our own today.”

Steve looks forward to his day with relish.  He’s meeting Dr. Erskine to plan the illustrations for the doctor’s new medical encyclopedia, which will be distributed to hospitals and village doctors across the kingdom.  After Bucky’s morning with his council and the House of Lords they will have lunch, and then spend the afternoon together.  Bucky is sitting for a new portrait.  It’s going to be scandalously informal, with Bucky sitting at his desk only in his shirtsleeves, baring his forearms, left and right.  Steve is looking forward to rendering the shimmering steel of his husband’s left side. 

Steve reaches up to stroke his hand across Bucky’s cheek bone, thumbing at the kiss swollen pink of his bottom lip. 

“As long as we have each other,” Steve says with a smile, “And our courage.”  Bucky catches Steve’s hand and kisses it. 

“And a little magic?” Bucky asks with a wink.  Steve laughs.

“Exactly.”

**Author's Note:**

> UPDATE: I just realized I totally forgot about the cat! Dum dum came with steve to the palace, where he lives in the lap of luxury. He has a silk bed in steves studio which he never uses, preferring to sleep in valuable and inconveniently located works if sculpture.


End file.
